3i8 VARRO ON FARMING [bk. 



clad in a stola^ and on the order to sing to his 

 cithara blew a blast on the horn, whereat a host of 

 stags, wild boars, and other quadrupeds poured 

 round us, making as fine a show, I thought, as when 

 the Aediles give us a hunt without African ^ beasts 

 in the Circus Maximus. 



CHAPTER XIV 



OF SNAILS 



1 Said Axius, Your part, my friend Merula, has been 

 made lighter by Appius. The second act, which 

 concerned hunting, has been quickly gone through, 

 and as for what remains — snails and dormice — I am 

 not anxious to hear about them, as the subject can 

 present no great difficulty. More than you think, 

 Axius my dear fellow, said Appius, for you have to 

 find a suitable place for your snail-beds, and it must 

 be open to the sky and entirely surrounded by water, 

 lest when you put snails in it to breed, you find not 

 only the children gone, but the mothers as well. 

 You must, I repeat, keep them confined by means 

 of water, or else you will have to get a ** slave- 

 catcher."^ 



2 The best spot is one visited by dew and not baked 



' Africanis bestiis, i.e., panthers. Cf. Pliny, viii, 17. 



' Fug^ltivarius. A mild but thoroughly characteristic joke 

 of Varro's. T\vq> fugitivarius was the man hired to track and 

 bring back a runaway {fugitivus) slave. 



