BOOK XVIII. IV. 20-V. 23 



called the Quintian Meadows, and indeed it is said 

 that he had stripped for the work, and the messenger 

 as he continued to Unger said, ' Put on your clothes, 

 so that I mav deHver the mandates of the Senate 

 and People of Rome '. That was what apparitors 

 were Uke even at that time, and their name itself" 

 was given to tliem as summoning the senate and the 

 leaders to put in an immediate appearance from 

 their farms. But nowadaA'S those agricultural opera- 

 tions are performed by slaves with fettered ankles 

 and by the hands of malefactors with branded faces ! 

 although the Earth who is addressed as our mother 

 and whose cultivation is spoken of' as worship is 

 not so duU that wlien we obtain even our farm-work 

 from these persons one can beUeve that this is not 

 done against her wiU and to her indignation. And 

 we forsooth are surprised that we do not get the 

 same profits from the labour of slave-gangs '" as used 

 to be obtained from that of generals ! 



\'. Consequently to give instructions for agricul- Eariy 

 ture was an occupation of the highest dignity even ^alHc^lwre. 

 with foreign nations, inasmuch as it was actuaUy 

 performed by kings such as Hiero, Attalus Philo- 

 metor and Archelaus, and by generals such as 

 Xenophon and also the Carthaginian Mago, on 

 whom indeed our senate bestowed such great 

 honour, after the taking of Carthage, that when it 

 gave away the city's Ubrarics to the petty kings of 

 Africa it passed a resolution that in his case alone 

 his twenty-eight volumes should be translated into 

 Latin, in spite of the fact that Marcus Cato had 

 already compiled his book of precepts, and that the 

 task should be given to persons acquainted with 

 the Carthaginian language, an accompUshment in 



203 



