BOOK VI. 11. 15-111. 3 



strong sinews and muscles and not encumbered by- 

 fat, so that it may not be wearied either by the 

 weight of its own body or by the exertion necessary 

 for its work. But since we have now set down the 

 principles which must be followed in buying oxen 

 and in breaking them in, we will next give directions 

 for the care of them. 



III. Oxen should remain out of doors when it is The care 

 warm and under cover when it is cold ; therefore, for o?oxra^'"* 

 their winter stabling, straw must be prepared, which 

 ought to be cut and heaped up in stacks in August with- 

 in thirty days of the gathering of the harvest. The 

 cutting of the straw is beneficial both to the cattle 

 and to the ground ; for the fields are thus freed from 

 briers, which, if they are cut back in the summer at 

 the time of the rising of the Dogstar, usually die off 

 at the roots, and also, if straw is put down as litter 

 for the cattle, it produces a very large quantity of 

 dung. 



When we have arranged for this, we shall make 

 provision also for every kind of fodder and ensure 

 that the cattle will not be thin for want of food. 2 

 There is more than one system of feeding cattle 

 properly. If the fertility of the district supplies 

 green fodder, there is no doubt that this kind of food 

 is to be preferred to all others ; but this is only to be 

 found in well-watered or dewy places. In these 

 circumstances there is the very great advantage 

 that one farm-labourer is enough to look after two 

 yoke of oxen, which on the same day either plough 

 or graze alternately. On drier farms the oxen 3 

 must be fed at their stalls, the fodder provided 

 varying according to the nature of the district. 

 There can be no doubt that the best foods are vetches 



137 



