BOOK III. III. 13-1V. 2 



averse to purchasing quicksets from me at a price 

 of six hundred sesterces a thousand. But anyone 14 

 else ^vill hardly go beyond the above-named figure ; 

 for no one w\\\ readily take our word for it that there 

 is such a quantity of wine upon our small pieces of 

 ground as you, Silvinus, know to be the case. For 

 that reason I have (|uoted the average and customary 

 price of quicksets, so that those who, through want 

 of knowledge, avoid this branch of husbandry, may 

 be brought over more quickly to my opinion with 

 no dissenting vote. Therefore either the revenue 15 

 from ground prepared for planting or the hope of 

 vintages to come should encourage us in the plant- 

 ing of vines. And now that we have shown that it 

 is consistent with good business to plant them, we 

 shall offer directions for putting them in order. 



IV. One who has it at heart to make plantations of 

 \nnes should guard especially against the willingness 

 to entrust them to another's care in preference to 

 his ov/n ; and he should not buy quicksets. But he 

 should plant at home shoots of the sort most ap- 

 proved, and should make a nursery of vines from 

 which he may clothe his land with vineyards. For 

 foreign cuttings, transplanted from a different locality, 

 are less at home in our soil than are the native 

 varieties, and for that reason, being strangers, so 

 to speak, they dread a change of climate and 

 situation ; and also they offer no definite assurance 2 

 of quahty, seeing that it is uncertain whether the 

 one who has planted them has set out shoots of a 

 carefully tested and approved variety. Therefore 

 a period of two years must be considered the mini- 



* perenna (peregryna in marg. A) SA. 



263 



