352 VARRO ON FARMING [bk. 



Naples had pierced a mountain ' and let in the sea 

 into his fish-ponds, whereby the latter themselves 

 became tidal, had as fine a fishing-ground as 

 Neptune — for it seems as though he had brought 

 his beloved fish on account of the boiling heat into 

 a cooler climate, as is the custom of the Apulian ^ 

 cattle breeders, who lead their flocks along the 

 cattle-tracks to the Sabine mountains. And in the 

 case of his country-house at Baiae he was when 

 building it consumed with such eagerness that he 

 gave his architect permission to spend money 

 as though it were his (the architect's) own, pro- 

 vided that he managed to make a passage from 

 his fish-ponds to the sea, and threw out a mole by 

 which twice a day from the first quarter of the moon 

 to the next new moon the tide could come in and go 

 back to the sea — and thus cool his fish-ponds, 

 lo Our conversation had reached this point when 

 there was a noise on the right, and our candidate, 

 now aedile-designate came into the Villa Publica 

 clad in the toga ^ praetexta. We went up to him 



^ Montem. Cf. Pliny, ix, 54. Lucullus exciso etiam vionte 

 iuxta Neapolim maiore impendio quam villam aedificaverat^ 

 euripum et maria admisit. Qua de causa Magnus Pompeius 

 Xerxen togatum eum appellahat. This Neapolitan villa is men- 

 tioned by Cicero (Academicorum, ii, 3) in connection with 

 Hortensius's villa, ad Baulos, on the occasion of a visit paid by 

 Cicero, Catulus, and Lucullus to Hortensius. It stood on the 

 hill of Posilipo, where Vedius Pollio, Vergil, and many others 

 had villas. 



^ Ut Apuli Solent. Cf. ii, i, 16, and ii, 2, 9. 



^ Cum lata. Their candidate had just been elected Curule 



