84? THE CLOVER CROP. 



lation increased, we find the necessity for a systematic cul- 

 tivation forcing itself on the people, who required not 

 only a regular supply of vegetable but also of animal 

 food, and who required also the assistance of their animals 

 as sources of power in the various operations in which they 

 were engaged. To feed these properly, and thus make 

 them subserve the double purpose of furnishing a supply 

 of power and also of food to the people, was well-nigh as 

 important as to secure the direct food-supplies of the people 

 themselves; and thus we see, in the pages of the Roman 

 agricultural authors, the great attention that was paid to 

 "forage crops "during the later periods of the Roman 

 empire. In the days of barbarian Rome, when the inha- 

 bitants were few and their wants easily supplied, cultiva- 

 tion was confined to those plants which formed the food 

 of man, and the cattle were left to obtain their supplies 

 from the indigenous herbage of the fields. In the days of 

 imperial Rome an increased population had necessarily in- 

 creased wants, while the area of supply remained the same, 

 and could only meet those wants by largely increasing its 

 yield under a regulated system of cultivation. This con- 

 viction was clearly felt by the enlightened and practical 

 Roman farmers; the loose mode of growing their crops, 

 which, although bringing plenty one year, might prove an 

 entire blank the next, was gradually exchanged for one 

 based upon more defined and rational grounds, embracing, 

 in many instances, principles which we are able to hold 

 up as examples even at the present day. Not only were 

 all the operations of husbandry studied and described, the 

 nature and suitability of soils for different crops discussed, 

 but amongst the crops recommended for cultivation were 

 those which were most suitable for the support of the ani- 

 mals so necessary to the farm, both as sources of power and 

 of clothing arid food to the inhabitants of the country. 

 In the plants cultivated for this purpose we find many 



