BOOK III. XIII. 7-IO 



whatever direction they creep out, not repelling their 

 gro%\-th by its hardness, but taking them into its 

 tender nourishing bosom, as it were, admitting the 

 rains of heaven and dispensing them for the sustenance 

 of the plants, and acting ^^'ith all its members in har- 

 mony for the rearing of its new offspring. 



A level field should be dug two and one-half feet 8 

 deep, a sloping region three feet ; but a steeper hill 

 should be turned to a depth of four feet, because 

 when earth is carried down from a higher to a lower 

 place, the amount thro^\^l back is barely suificient 

 for trenching unless you make the bank much higher 

 than on level ground. On the other hand, in 

 sunken valleys it is not proper to set the vine less than 

 two feet deep. For it is better not to plant it at all 

 than to leave it suspended on the surface of the 

 earth ; except, however, when marshy ground stands 

 in the wav, as in the district about Ravenna, and 

 prevents digging deeper than a foot and a half. It 9 

 is, moreover, a first principle of the aforesaid opera- 

 tion not to deepen the furrow little by little, as is the 

 practice of most farmers of our time, and so by a sec- 

 ond or third gradation to arrive at the intended 

 depth of trencliing; but, running a line evenly 

 forward, to extend a continuous trench \\'ith 

 perpendicular sides and to pile the earth together 

 behind you as it is removed, and to sink the trench 

 dowTi until it has reached the prescribed measure of 

 depth. Then the line must be moved evenly over the 10 

 whole extent of the gradation ; and you must see to 

 it that the width is made the same at the bottom 

 as it was started at the top. There is need, too, of 

 an experienced and watchful overseer to give 

 orders that the bank be made plumb and the furrow 



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