BOOK IV 



I. You say, Publius Silvinus, that when you had 

 read over to several students of agriculture the 

 book which I have written on the planting of vine- 

 yards, some persons were found who, indeed, had 

 praise for the rest of our teachings, though they 

 criticized one or two : in that I advised the making 

 of excessively deep trenches for vine plants by adding 

 three-fourths of a foot to the two-foot depth which 

 Celsus and Atticus had recorded ; and that I had 

 shown little wisdom in assigning each quickset to its 

 individual support when those same authors allowed 

 them, at less expense, to clothe two successive props 

 in the same row with the branches of one vine separ- 

 ated into two parts. 



Both these objections are based upon false reason- 

 ing rather than true judgment. For, to refute first 2 

 what I first proposed, if we are to be content with a 

 tivo-foot trench, why are we of such a mind as to 

 work the ground deeper when we intend to set the 

 vines at so shallow a depth .'' Some one will say, 

 " So that there may be a lower layer of soft ground 

 underneath which will not, by its hardness, check 

 the young creeping rootlets or thrust them back." 

 It is possible, indeed, to accomplish that end also if the 3 



* continere Aac. 



353 



