Book 6

I am well aware, Publius Silvinus, that there are some intelligent farmers who have refused to keep cattle and have consistently rejected the pursuit of the master of a flock as harmful to their profession.I do not deny that they have some reason for so doing on the ground that the aim of the farmer is contrary to that of the shepherd, since the former rejoices in land which is tilled and cleared to the greatest possible extent, while the latter takes pleasure in ground which is fallow and grassy; the one hopes for the fruits of the earth, the other for the produce of his cattle, and so the cultivator detests while on the other hand the grazier longs for a rich yield of grass.

But, in spite of these irreconcilable desires, there exists a sort of alliance and union between them, because, firstly, it is generally better to use the food provided by one's own farm in feeding one's own cattle rather than those of other people, and, secondly, because it is owing to the plentiful use of manure, which is derived from flocks, that the fruits of the earth abound.

Nor indeed is there any region in which nothing but cereals is grown and which is not cultivated quite as much by the aid of cattle as of men. Hence also draught-animals (iumenta) and animals which draw the plough (armenta)

derive their names from the fact that they aid our labour either by carrying burdens or by ploughing. a

Therefore, as the ancient Romans taught, I myself am also of the opinion that we should thoroughly understand the management of cattle as well as the cultivation of the fields.For in the history of farming the system of grazing is certainly very ancient and at the same time very profitable, and it is on this account also that the names for money (pecunia) and private property (peculium) seem to have been derived from the word for cattle (pecus), because this was the only possession which the men of old time had, and, even at the present day, amongst some peoples, this is the only kind of wealth in general use, and even among our farmers there is nothing which yields a richer increase.

This was the opinion of Marcus Cato among others, who, when someone seeking advice asked him what department of agriculture he should practise in order to get rich quickly, replied that he would get rich if he were a competent grazier. When the same person went on to ask him what is the second best thing to do in order to obtain a sufficiently rich return, Cato insisted that he could achieve this by being a moderately good grazier. I feel some hesitation in relating about so wise a man the reply, which some authors attribute to him, when the same person enquired what was the third most lucrative practice in agriculture, namely, for a man to be even a bad grazier; since certainly the losses which attend a lazy and ignorant grazier are greater than the profits which attend one who is prudent and careful. As for Cato's second answer, there is no doubt that the profit from cattle more than makes up for a moderate amount of carelessness on the part of their owner. a

It is on this account, Silvinus, that, following the precepts of our forefathers, we have taken all the pains which we can to hand on to posterity an account of this department of agriculture also.

There are, then, two classes of four footed animals, one of which we procure to share our labours, such as the ox, the mule, the horse and the ass, and the other which we keep for our pleasure and the profit which they bring us or for keeping watch, such as the sheep, the goat, the pig and the dog. We will deal first with the class which we employ to take part in our work. There is no doubt, as Varro says, that the ox ought to be ranked above all other cattle, especially in Italy, which is believed to have derived its name from this animal, which the Greeks formerly called italos,b and in that city c at the founding of whose walls an ox and a cow drew the plough which marked its boundaries; also because, to go still further back, at Athens in Attica the ox too is said to have been the attendant of Ceres (Demeter)and Triptolemus,and because it has its place in the heavens, among the most brilliant constellations, and, lastly, because it is still man's most hardworking associate in agriculture, and so great was the respect in which it was held among the ancients that it was equally a capital crime to have killed an ox and to have killed a fellow-citizen. Let us, therefore, begin the task before us with the ox.

I should find it far from easy to say what are the points to be looked for and what to be avoided in the purchase of oxen; for cattle show variation in bodily form and disposition and the colour of their hair according to the nature of the district and climate in which they five.

Those of Asia and of Gaul and of Epirus are different in form, and not only are there diversities in the various provinces, but Italy itself shows varieties in its different parts. Campania generally produces small, white oxen, which are, however, well suited for their work and for the cultivation of their native soil. Umbria breeds huge white oxen, but it also produces red oxen, esteemed not less for their spirit than for their bodily strength.

Etruria and Latium breed oxen which are thick-set but powerful as workers. The oxen bred in the Apennines are very tough and able to endure every kind of hardship but not comely to look upon. Though there is so much variety and diversity, yet there are certain as it were universal and fixed principles which the farmer of arable land ought to follow in buying bullocks.' Mago a the Carthaginian has laid down these principles in the form which we will now detail. The bullocks which should be purchased are those which are young, squarely built, with large limbs and horns which are long and blackish and strong; the forehead should be wide and covered with curly hair, the ears shaggy, the eyes and lips dark in colour, the nostrils bent back and wide spreading, the neck long and muscular, the dewlap ample and falling almost to the knees, the chest broad, the shoulders huge; the belly should be capacious and have the appearance of pregnancy, the flanks extended, the loins wide, the back straight and flat or even sinking slightly, the buttocks round, the legs compact and straight but short rather than long and the knees not ill-shaped, the hoofs large, the tail very long and bristly, the hair all over the body thick and short and of a red or brindle colour and the body very soft to the touch.

Calves of such a strain, you must accustom, while they are still young, to allow themselves to be handled and fastened to their mangers, so that there may be little trouble and less danger in breaking them in.

The general opinion is that bullocks should not be broken in before their third or after their fifth year, since the former age is as yet too tender and the latter too hard. Those which are taken wild from the herd ought to be tamed in the following manner. First of all a spacious shed should be got ready, where the trainer may be able to move about easily and from which he can withdraw without danger.

There should be no narrow spaces in front of the. shed but either open country or a wide road, so that, when the bullocks are driven forth, they may have room to escape and that they may not, in their alarm, become entangled in trees or anything else which gets in their way and hurt themselves. In the shed there should be roomy stalls, and overhead horizontal beams should be fixed shaped like yokes, raised seven feet above the ground to which the bullocks can be tied.

Then, to inaugurate the training, choose the morning of a day which is free from storms and not the occasion of any religious ceremony and fasten the horns of the bullocks with hempen cords. The nooses with which they are caught should be wrapped round with woolly skins, so that the tender part of the forehead below the horns may not be injured. Then when you have captured the steers, you should lead them to the shed and attach them to the posts in such a way that their ropes give very little play and that they are a little distance apart from one another, so that they may not hurt each other in their struggles. If they are too savage, allow them a day and a night to expend their fury, and as soon as the edge of their anger is blunted, they should be driven forth early in the morning, care being taken that several persons follow them behind also and hold them back by their tethers while one man, going in front of them with a club of willow wood in his hand, from time to time restrains their onrush with light blows.

If, however, the cattle are placid and quiet, it will be possible for you to drive them out even before the evening of the day on which you have tied them up and train them to walk for a thousand paces in an orderly manner and without fear.

When you have conducted them home again, you should bind them very closely to the posts, so that they cannot move their heads. Then is the time to approach the oxen, when they are tied, not from behind or from the side but from straight in front, quietly and by using a soothing tone of voice, in order that they may become accustomed to see you approaching them, and next rub their noses so that they may learn to know a man by his odour. Soon after this it is also a good plan both to stroke their hides all over and to sprinkle them with unmixed wine, so that they may become on more familiar terms with their oxherd; it is well also to put the hand on the belly and under the thighs, so that they may not be alarmed if they are touched in this way afterwards, and also so that ticks, which generally fasten on the thighs, may be removed.

In doing this the trainer ought to stand at the side, so that the animal may not reach him with its hoof. After this you should pull the jaws apart and draw out the tongue and rub the whole mouth and palate with salt and put down the animal's throat cakes of a pound's weight of meal moistened with well-salted drippings of fat, and pour into their jaws a sextarius of wine at a time by means of a horn; for by blandishments of this kind they generally become tame in three days and allow themselves to be yoked on the fourth day.

This yoke has the bough of a tree tied to it instead of a pole; a sometimes too a weight is attached, so that the capacity of the animal for enduring toil may be tested by the greater effort which is involved. After experiments of this kind the bullocks should be yoked to an empty wagon and gradually be made to go longer journeys with loads. Soon after they have been thus broken in, they should be set to draw the plough, but over land already tilled, so that they may not be frightened at first by the difficulty of their task and that their still tender necks may not be bruised by the tough first breaking of the ground. I have already in my first book b given instructions how the ploughman is to train the ox in ploughing. Care must be taken that the ox does not strike anyone with his hoof or his horn while he is being trained; for, unless precautions are taken against this, it will never be possible to get rid of faults of this kind, though the animal has been broken in.

The method which we are prescribing should be followed only if no ox is available which has already done service; otherwise the system of training which we follow on our own farm is more expeditious and safer.

For when we are accustoming the young bullock to the wagon or plough, we yoke with the untrained animal the strongest and at the same time quietest of the trained oxen, which both keeps it back if it rushes forward and makes it advance if it lags behind. Indeed, if we have no objection to constructing a yoke to which three animals can be fastened, Ave shall by this device achieve the result that even obstinate oxen do not refuse the heaviest tasks. For when an idle bullock is yoked between two veteran oxen and forced to till the ground with the plough which is put upon them, he has no opportunity of refusing to obey the order which has been given him; for, if he has become savage and rushes forward, he is checked by the controlling power of the other two; or, if he stands still when the other two pace along, he also follows even against his will; or, if he tries to lie down, he is upheld and dragged along by his more powerful companions. Hence he is forced from all sides to lay aside his obstinacy, and it takes very few blows to induce him to submit to hard work.

There is also an ox of a softer kind after it has been broken in, which lies down in the furrow; in my opinion he should be made to mend his ways by reasoning rather than by cruelty. Those who think that the vice is better eradicated by means of goads, fire or other forms of torture, do not know how to reason aright; for the animal's stubborn obstinacy usually wears out the angry ploughman. Hence it is more expedient to cure the ox which has the habit of lying down by hunger and thirst without having recourse to doing it bodily hurt; for its natural desires affect it more deeply than blows.

So, if an ox has lain down, the best plan is for its feet to be fastened together with straps in such a way that it can neither stand up nor walk nor feed.

As a result, under the compulsion of starvation and thirst, it lays aside its sloth, which, however, is very rarely found amongst our home-grown cattle. Indeed a native ox is far superior to one which comes from elsewhere; for it is not disturbed by change of water or food or climate and is not troubled by the local conditions, as an ox would be which has been brought from flat plain-lands to a rough mountainous country or vice versa. When, therefore, we are obliged to bring oxen from a distance, care must be taken that they are transferred to country which resembles that in which they were born. You must also be on your guard when pairing oxen together not to yoke one which is inferior in height or strength with one which is more powerful; for either of these circumstances quickly proves fatal to the weaker of the two.

Characteristics which are esteemed in oxen are possessed by those which are placid rather than excitable and at the same time not lazy, and which are afraid of blows or shouts, but, being confident in their own strength, are not alarmed by anything which they hear or see, and which are not nervous at having to cross rivers or bridges, and which can eat plenty of food but are slow in finishing it; for leisurely chewers digest better and therefore preserve their bodily strength without becoming thin better than those which eat their food hurriedly.

But it is quite as much a fault in an oxherd to make his oxen fat as to make them thin; for the bodily form of a working ox ought to be active and moderate in bulk, with 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.

Oxen should remain out of doors when it is warm and under cover when it is cold; therefore, for their winter stabling, straw must be prepared, which ought to be cut and heaped up in stacks in August within 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.

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 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 tied up in bundles and chickpea and also meadow-hay. We are not looking after our cattle so well if we feed them on chaff, which is a universal, and in some districts the only, resource. The chaff which is most highly esteemed comes from millet, the next best from barley, and the third best from wheat; beasts of burden which are rendering regular terms of labour are given barley as well as chaff.

The diet of oxen is regulated according to the time of year.

In January it is a good plan to give them four sextarii each of bitter-vetch crushed and soaked in water and mixed with chaff, or a modius of soaked lupines, or half a modius of soaked chickling-pea, as well as chaff in abundance. If there is a lack of pulse, it is allowable to mix with chaff grape skins taken from the after-wine which have been washed and dried, but there is no doubt that it is far better to give them the grapemash, skins and all, before they have been washed, for they contain the strength both of food and of wine and make the cattle sleek and of good cheer and plump.

If we abstain from giving them grain, it is enough to supply a fodder-basket holding twenty modii of dry leaves or thirty pounds of hay, or green bay-leaves or the foliage of the holm-oak in unlimited quantities. To these mast is added, if the resources of the district permit, but, unless enough is provided to cause satiety, it causes the scab. A half-modius of crushed beans may also be provided, if a good crop makes it cheap enough to do so. In February the food is usually the same.

In March and April an addition should be made to the weight of hay in places where the ground is being broken up for the first time; forty pounds, however, will be enough to give to each animal. From April

13th to June 15th it is proper to cut green forage for them; supply of it can even be continued until July 1st in cooler regions.

From then through the whole summer and the following autumn up to November 1st, they should be given their fill of leaves, which, however, are not fit for use until matured either by rain or by continual dew. The most highly esteemed is the foliage of the elm, next comes that of the ash, and, thirdly, that of the poplar; the least satisfactory is that of the holm-oak, the oak and the bay-tree, but these may have to be used after the summer, if all other kinds fail.

It is also proper to give them fig-leaves, if there is abundance of them or if it is expedient to strip the trees. Holm-oak-leaves are better than oak-leaves, but they should. not be of the kind that has spines, for this is refused by cattle because of the prickles, as also are juniper-leaves. In November and December, during the period of sowing, an ox should be given all the food which it wants; but a modius of mast a head is generally enough and as much chaff as they can eat, or a modius of soaked lupines or seven sextarii of bitter-vetch sprinkled with water and mixed with chaff, or twelve sextarii of chickpeas similarly sprinkled and mixed with chaff, or a modius of grape-skins each, provided that, as I have said above, chaff is generously added to them; if none of these foods is available, forty pounds of hay should be given by itself.

It will be no use to give cattle a satisfying diet unless every care is taken that they are healthy their rem-in body and that they keep up their strength. Both edie8, these objects are secured by administering on three consecutive days a generous dose of medicine com- pounded of equal weights of the crushed leaves of the lupine and of the cypress, which is mixed with water and left out of doors for a night.

This should be done four times a year—at the end of the spring, of the summer, of the autumn and of the winter. Lassitude and nausea also can often be dispelled if you force a whole raw hen's egg down the animal's throat when it has eaten nothing; then on the following day you should crush together spikes of leek or garlic in wine and pour it into its nostrils.

Nor are these the only remedies which make for health. Many people mix also a generous quantity of salt with the fodder; some grate white hore-hound in oil and wine; some infuse fibres of leek, others grains of frankincense, others savin a and crushed rue in unmixed wine and give them these medicaments to drink. Many people use the stalks of white-vine (bryony) and the shells of bitter-vetch as a medicine for oxen; some crush a snake's skin and mix it with wine.

Thyme crushed in sweet wine and squill cut up and soaked in water are also used as remedies. All the above-mentioned potions in doses of three heminae given daily for three days purge the bowel and renew the animal's strength by driving away its maladies. But lees of olive-oil are regarded as particularly salutary if you mix them with an equal portion of water and accustom the cattle to them; this remedy cannot be administered all at once, but at first is sprinkled on the food, next a small portion is infused in the water, and then the animal is given as much as it can take mixed in equal portions of both ingredients.

At no season of the year and least of all in the summer is it beneficial to incite oxen to run; for this either relaxes the bowels or else often gives rise to fever.

Care must also be taken that no pig or chicken slips into their stalls, for the excrement which falls from them, mixed with their food, is fatal to oxen. A diseased sow may cause plague. If this falls upon a herd, a change of climate must immediately be made, and the cattle must be divided up, in a number of groups, and sent to distant places and those which are infected segregated from the healthy, that no infected animal may come into contact with the rest and destroy them with the contagion. When they are thus isolated, they have to be taken to places where no herd is pastured, so that they may not by their arrival bring the plague there also.

Diseases, however pestilential, must be overcome and expelled by carefully sought-out remedies. Sometimes roots of all-heal and sea-holly should be mixed with fennel-seeds and, together with flour of crushed and ground wheat, should be sprinkled with boiling water, and the suffering herd given a drench with this medicament. Sometimes a potion consisting of equal weights of cinnamon, myrrh and frankincense and a like quantity of the blood of a sea-tortoise is mixed with three sextarii of old wine and poured through the animal's nostrils. It will suffice to have given the medicine itself divided into equal doses of one and a half ounces together with wine for three days. We have also found a sovereign remedy in the root which the shepherds call consiligo. a It grows in large quantities in the Marsian mountains and is very salutary for all cattle; it is dug up with the left hand before sunrise, for it is believed to have greater potency if it is picked in this way.

The following is the traditional manner of using it.

A line is drawn round the widest part of the ear-lap with brazen pin in such a way that a figure resembling the letter O appears where the blood flows. When this operation has been performed both inside and on the upper part of the ear, the middle of the circle which has been described is pierced with the same pin and the root mentioned above is inserted in the hole thus made, and, when the newly made wound has closed on it, it holds the root so tightly that it cannot slip out. Then all the virulence of the disease and the poison of the plague is attracted to this ear, until the part round which the line was described by the pin mortifies and comes away. Thus the head is saved by the sacrifice of a very small portion of it. Cornelius

Celsus a also recommends the pouring into the nostrils of wine in which the leaves of mistletoe have been crushed. The latter course must be adopted if the cattle are suffering as a herd, the former if individual animals are affected.

Signs of indigestion are frequent eructations, rumblings of the belly, distaste for food, tension of the sinews and dimness of the sight, with the result that the ox neither ruminates nor cleanses himself by licking.

The appropriate remedy will be two congii of hot water, followed by thirty moderate-sized stalks of cabbage cooked and dipped in vinegar; but the animal must abstain from other food for one day. Some people keep the animal shut up indoors, so that it cannot graze; they then mix four pounds of the tops of mastic and wild olive crushed up with a pound of honey in a congius of water, which they keep for one night in the open air, and then pour it down the animal's throat.

Then after an interval of an hour they put before it four pounds of soaked bitter-vetch and keep it away from any other drink. This should be continued for three days, so that every cause of lassitude is dissipated.

If indigestion is neglected, inflation of the belly and more severe pain in the intestines follow, which does not allow the animal to take its food, causes it to bellow, does not suffer it to remain in one place, and makes it lie down frequently, toss its head and lash its tail continually. An obvious remedy is to bind down tightly the part of the tail nearest to the haunches and to pour down its throat a sextarius of wine and a hemina of oil and then drive it for a mile and a half at a quick pace. If the pain persists, you should cut the hoof all round, draw off the excrement by greasing the hand and inserting it into the anus, and again drive the animal at a running pace.

If this also has done no good, three dried wild figs are crushed and administered with a dodrans of hot water. If this remedy has also been unsuccessful, two pounds of the leaves of wild myrtle are pulverized and mixed with the same number of sextarii of hot water and poured down the throat by means of a wooden ' vessel; then the animal is bled under the tail and, when enough blood has flowed, it is checked by a bandage of papyrus; then the animal is driven at a quick speed until it is out of breath. The following remedies are applied before drawing off any blood: a triens of pounded garlic is mixed with three heminae of wine, and, after drinking this, the animal is compelled to run; or else a sextans of salt is pounded up with ten onions, and after being mixed with boiled- down honey is introduced as a suppository into the bowel and the ox is driven at a quick pace.

Pain in the belly and intestines is assuaged by the sight of swimming birds, especially a duck.

If an ox which has a pain in its intestines sees a duck, it is quickly delivered from its torment. The sight of a duck is also even more successful in curing mules and the race of horses. Sometimes, however, no remedy is of any avail and colic follows, the sign of which is a flux of blood and mucous matter from the belly. The cure for this consists of fifteen cypress-cones and the same number of oak-apples and very old cheese equal in weight to the other two ingredients.

When these have been pounded up together, four sextarii of rough wine are mixed with them, and the mixture is administered in equal doses for four days; nor should tops of mastic and myrtle and wild olive be lacking. Diarrhoea a wastes the body and the strength and renders an animal useless for work. When this happens, the ox will have to be kept from drinking for two days and on the first day must be kept from eating; but soon thereafter tops of wild olive and of reeds must be given, also berries of mastic and myrtle, but no opportunity of drinking water must be allowed except as sparingly as possible.

Some people crush a pound of tender leaves of bay and the same quantity of horned southernwood b in two sextarii of hot water and pour it down the animal's throat and put before it the same food as I mentioned above. Some people.heat two pounds of grape-skins and crush them in two sextarii of rough wine and then give them to be drunk as a medicine, keeping any other liquid away from them, but nevertheless putting before them the tops of the trees mentioned above. But if neither the violent flux from the belly nor the pain in the intestine and stomach has ceased and the animal refuses his food, and its head is very heavy and it frequently blinks and tears flow from its eyes and slime from its nostrils, the middle of its forehead should be burnt down to the bone and its ears cleft with a knife. It is in fact a good plan to rub with ox-urine the wounds caused by the fire while they are healing; but those which are due to cuts with the knife are better treated with pitch and oil.

Aversion to food is often caused by morbid swellings of the tongue which veterinary surgeons " call frogs. They are cut back with a knife and the wounds rubbed with salt and garlic crushed together in equal quantities, until a viscous discharge thus provoked flows forth.

The mouth is then washed out with wine and after the interval of one hour a diet of green herbs or leaves is administered until the sores which had formed are scarred over. If no frogs have formed and the bowel is not disturbed but nevertheless the animal has no appetite for its food, it will be beneficial to pour a mixture of pounded garlic and oil through its nostrils or to rub the throat with salt and marjoram, or to smear the same part with crushed garlic and fish-sauce. But this remedy should be used if aversion to food is the only symptom.

When an ox suffers from fever, it is a good plan that it should go without food for a day, and that on the following day a little blood should be drawn off under the tail before it eats anything, and that after an interval of an hour it should be made to swallow thirty cooked stalks of cabbage of moderate size which have been dipped in oil and pickled fish in the manner of drench.

This food should be given for five days on an empty stomach. Furthermore, tops of mastic or olive or any other very tender foliage and vine-shoots should be placed before it, also its lips should be wiped with a sponge and cold water given it to drink three times a day. This treatment should be carried out under cover and the animal should not be allowed to go out until it is cured. The symptoms of a state of fever are running at the eyes, a heavy head, contracted eyes, a flow of saliva from the mouth, an unusually slow and a somehow obstructed respiration, accompanied also at times by lowing.

A cough, if treated early, is best dispelled by a medicine which causes salivation made of barley-flour. Sometimes grass cut up small and crushed beans mixed with it are more beneficial; also two sextarii of lentils removed from their pods and ground up small are mixed with hot water and the draught thus formed is poured down the throat through a horn. A cough of long standing is cured with two pounds of hyssop infused in three sextarii of water.

Now this medicament is crushed up and administered with four sextarii of lentils ground small, in the manner I have described, and given to cause salivation, and the hyssop-water is afterwards poured in through a horn. The juice of a leek together with oil, or the fibre itself of the leeks crushed up with barley-flour, is also used as a cure; the roots too of the same plant carefully washed and pounded up with wheaten flour, given to the animal when it is fasting, dispel the most inveterate cough. The same effect is produced by bitter-vetch without its husk pounded up with an equal portion of toasted barley and poured down the throat in the manner of a drench.

It is better to get rid of suppuration by the surgeon's knife than with medicine.

Then, when the pus has been squeezed out, the sinus itself which contained it is washed out with warm ox-urine and then bound up with linen bandages soaked in liquid pitch and oil, or, if the part affected cannot be bound up, goat's or ox's tallow is dripped upon it by means of a red hot plate of iron. Some people, when they have cauterized the part affected, wash it with stale human urine and then anoint it with raw liquid pitch and stale axle-grease in equal quantities.

Down-flow of blood into the animal's feet gives rise to lameness.

When this happens, the first thing that you should do is to inspect the hoof; merely touching it proves the presence of inflammation, and the animal cannot bear any at all violent pressure on the affected part. But if the blood is still in the legs above the hoofs, it can be dissipated by continual friction, or, if that has no effect, it can be removed by scarification. But if it has already reached the hoofs, you will make a slight incision with a lancet between the two halves of the hoof; then bandages dipped in salt and vinegar are applied and the foot is covered with a " slipper " of broom and the greatest care is taken to prevent the ox from putting his foot in water and that it keep dry in its stall.

This same blood, unless it is drawn off, will give rise to a bruise, and, if this suppurates, it will take a long time to heal. First a cut must be made round it with a knife and it must be cleaned, then it is brought to a healthy condition by having rags pressed against it soaked in vinegar, salt and oil, and afterwards by treatment with stale axle-grease and goat's tallow boiled in equal quantity. If the blood is in the lower part of the hoof, the extremity of the hoof itself is cut to the quick and the blood thus discharged, and the foot is wrapped in bandages and protected with a slipper of broom. It is not advisable to open the middle of the hoof from below, unless suppuration has already taken place in that part. If the lameness is due to pain in the sinews, the knees, the ham and the legs should be rubbed with oil and salt until it is cured.

If the knees are swollen, they must be fomented with warm vinegar and poulticed with linseed or millet which has been ground up and sprinkled with honey-water; also sponges soaked in boiling water and then wrung out and smeared with honey are correctly applied to the knees and wrapped round with bandages.

But if there is any liquid matter under the swelling, some yeast or barley-flour boiled in raisin-wine or honey-water is placed upon it; and when the suppuration has come to a head, it is cut with the surgeon's knife, and, when the pus has been extracted, it is treated with bandages in the manner I described above. Incisions made with the knife can also be treated, as Cornelius Celsus taught, by means of lily-roots or squills mixed with salt, or the staunching plant which the Greeks call polygonum,a or horehound. Almost all bodily pains, if there is no wound, can in their early stages be better dissipated by fomentation; in the advanced stage they are treated by cauterizations and the dropping of burnt butter or goat's fat upon the place.

The scab is alleviated if it is rubbed with bruised garlic, and the same remedy is used for the bite of a mad dog or wolf, which, however, is also quite as easily cured by placing stale pickled fish upon the wound.

There is also a still more efficacious remedy for the scab; ox-marjoram and sulphur are pounded up together and cooked in lees of olives mixed with oil and vinegar; then, when the mixture is hot, split alum is ground up and sprinkled upon it. This remedy is most efficacious if it is smeared on when the sun is hot. Ground oak-galls are a cure for ulcers, likewise the juice of horehound together with soot.

There is also a dangerous plague which affects cattle, called by the farmers hide-binding, when the skin adheres so closely to the back that, if it is taken hold of with the hands, it cannot be drawn away from the ribs.It occurs only when the ox is either reduced to a lean condition as the result of some illness or has become chilled when sweating in the course of its labours, or if it has been drenched by rain when it is carrying a load. Since these conditions are dangerous, care must be taken that the oxen, when they have returned from work still hot and panting, are sprinkled with wine and that balls of fat are thrust down their throats. If, however, the above-mentioned malady has already taken hold of them, it will be beneficial to make a concoction of bay-leaves and foment their backs with it while they are still warm and immediately after to massage them with a large quantity of oil and wine and to take hold of the hide all over the animal and draw it away. This is best done in the open air in burning sunshine. Some people mix dregs of oil with wine and fat and use it as a remedy after the fomentations mentioned above.

It is also a serious distemper when the lungs become ulcerated; it results in coughing and emaciation and finally in phthisis.

To prevent these conditions from causing death, a root of lungwort, as we prescribed above, is inserted in a hole made in the ear and then about a hemina of the juice of leek is mixed with a like quantity of oil and given as a potion for several days with a sextarius of wine. Sometimes too a swelling of the palate causes the animal to refuse its food and heave frequent sighs, and an impression is caused that it is hanging over towards one side. a It is beneficial also to make a wound in the palate with a knife, so that the blood may flow, and to administer bitter-vetch without its husk and soaked and green leaves or some other soft fodder, until the wound heals.

If in the course of its work the ox has his neck bruised, the most efficacious remedy is to draw blood from the ear, or, if that is not done, the herb called groundsel is crushed up with salt and placed on the part affected. If the neck is moved in a certain direction and hangs down, we shall examine and see to which side it declines and draw blood from the ear on the other side; moreover, what appears to be the largest vein in the ear is first beaten with a twig, and then when it has swollen up as a result of the blows, it is opened with a lancet, and on the following day blood is again drawn from the same spot and the animal is given two days' rest from work.

Then on the third day a light task is enjoined upon it, which is gradually increased until it does a full day's work. If, however, the neck does not incline to either side but is swollen in the middle, blood is let from both ears.

If bleeding is not performed within three days after the ox has got the disease, the neck swells up and the sinews become taut and as a result a hard lump is formed which cannot endure the pressure of the yoke. For this kind of malady we have discovered a suitable remedy composed of liquid pitch, beef-marrow, goat's fat, and stale, oil in equal quantities and cooked together.

This compound should be used in the following manner: when the ox is unharnessed after its work, the swelling on its neck is moistened with water in the trough from which it drinks and then massaged and rubbed and smeared with the medicament described above. If the animal absolutely refuses the yoke because of the swelling on its neck, it must be given a few days' rest from work; then the neck must be rubbed with cold water and anointed with litharge of silver.

Celsus indeed recommends that to a swollen neck the herb called groundsel should, as I have already said, be crushed and applied. The warts which generally infest the neck constitute only a minor malady; for they can easily be cured with oil dripped on them from a burning lamp. A better plan, however, is to take care that they do not form and that the necks of the oxen do not become bald, for they only become hairless when the neck is moistened by sweat or rain during work.

When this happens, therefore, their necks ought to be sprinkled with dust made by grinding brick-work before they are unyoked; then, when their necks have dried, they ought to be moistened from time to time with oil.

If the pastern or hoof has been injured by the ploughshare, wrap round it hard pitch and axle-grease, bind it with sulphur and greasy wool and make a burn above the wound with a piece of red-hot iron.

The same remedy has an excellent effect after the removal of a piece of wood from the hoof, if the ox has by chance trodden on a shoot or pierced its hoof with a sharp tile or stone. If, however, the wound is rather deep, a wider cut is made round it with a knife and it is then cauterized according to the method which I have described above; next the hoof is covered with a slipper made of broom and treated for three days with a suffusion of vinegar. Also if an ox has damaged its leg on the ploughshare, sea-spurge,a which the Greeks call tithymallus, mixed with salt, is applied to the wound. The feet are rubbed underneath and are washed with warmed ox-urine; then a bundle of twigs is burnt and when now the fire has sunk to embers, the animal is made to stand on the glowing ashes and the horny parts of the hoof are anointed with liquid pitch mixed with oil or axle-grease. Cattle, however, will be less likely to go lame, if their feet are washed in plenty of cold water when they are unyoked after work, and if their hocks, the crowns of their hoofs and the division itself between the two halves of the hoofs are rubbed with stale axle-grease.

It often happens that an ox wrenches its shoulders either owing to the weight of its load on a somewhat prolonged journey or when, in breaking up the ground, it has to struggle against an unusually hard patch or a root which gets in its way.

When this happens, blood must be drawn from its front legs—from the left leg if it has injured its right shoulder and from the right leg if the left shoulder is affected. If it has injured both shoulders rather seriously, veins will have to be opened in the hind legs as well. If the horns are broken, pieces of linen soaked in salt and vinegar and oil are put upon them and the same things poured over them for three days after they have been bound up; next on the fourth day axle-grease and liquid pitch in equal portions and pulverized pine-bark are applied, and, finally, when they are already beginning to scar over, they are rubbed with soot.

Ulcers, too, if they are neglected, generally swarm with worms.If they are drenched in the morning with cold water, they shrivel up with the cold and die. If they cannot be got rid of by this method, horehound or leek is pounded up and applied with a mixture of salt; this promptly kills these creatures. After the ulcers have been cleaned out, linen bandages must be immediately applied with pitch, oil and stale axle-grease, and the wounds must be anointed outside with the same medicament, so that they may not become infested by flies which, when they settle on the ulcers, breed worms.

The bite of a snake is also fatal to oxen, and the poison of certain lesser animals is also hurtful. For an ox while grazing often lies down unawares upon vipers and lizards, which, provoked by its weight, inflict a bite upon it.

The shrew-mouse, which the Greeks call mygale, though its teeth are small, gives rise to a malady which is far from being slight. A viper's poison can be expelled by scarifying with a knife the part affected and applying to it the herb called burdock, pounded up and mixed with salt. The crushed root of the same plant is even more beneficial, or the mountain trefoil, which grows in rugged places and is most efficacious, if it can be found; it has a strong odour like that of bitumen, whence the Greeks call it asphalteion, but our country-folk call it " sharp trefoil " from its shape, for it grows long, hairy leaves and forms a stouter stalk than the meadow trefoil.

The juice of this herb mixed with wine is poured down the throat, and the leaves themselves are pounded up with salt to form. a poultice.

If the season of the year makes it impossible to obtain this herb in a green state, its seeds are collected and pulverized and given with wine as a potion, while the roots are pounded up with their stalks and mixed with barley-flour and salt and, after being dipped in honey-water, are applied to the scarified part. A sovereign remedy is also provided by crushing five pounds of tender tops of ash with the same number of sextarii of wine and two of oil and by pouring the juice which you have squeezed out down the animal's throat. You should also apply the tops of the same tree pounded up with salt to the part affected.

The bite of a lizard causes swelling and suppuration, as also does that of a shrew-mouse, but the injury caused by the former is cured if you puncture the part affected with a brazen awl and anoint it with

Cimolian chalk a dipped in vinegar.The shrew-mouse atones with its own body for the harm which it has inflicted; for the animal itself is killed by being drowned in oil, and, when it has putrefied, it is crushed and the bite inflicted by the shrew-mouse is anointed with it as a remedy.

If this is not available and the swelling shows teeth-marks, cumin is crushed up and a little liquid pitch and axle-grease is added to it, so that it may have the soft consistency of a poultice. The application of this gets rid of the mischief. If the swelling turns into a suppuration before it is dispersed, it is best to cut away the abscess with a hot iron plate and burn away any harmful matter and then anoint the place with liquid pitch and oil. There is also a practice of encasing the shrew-mouse itself while still alive in potter's clay and, when the clay is dry, hanging it round the ox's neck. This renders the animal immune from the bite of a shrew-mouse.

Maladies of the eyes are generally cured with honey.

If they have swollen up, wheaten flour is sprinkled with honey water and applied to the eyes; or, if there is a white film on the eye, Spanish or Ammoniac or even Cappadocian rock-salt, pounded small and mixed with honey, lessens the malady. The shell of a cuttle-fish ground up and blown into the eye three times a day through a pipe has the same effect, as also has the root which the Greeks call silphion and of which the common name in our language is laserpitium. c To any quantity of this ten parts of

Ammoniac salt are added; and both are poured similarly into the eye after being ground up in the same manner, or else the root of the same plant crushed up and mixed with oil of mastic is used to anoint the eye and purges away the malady.

Running at the eyes is stopped by pearl-barley sprinkled with honey-water and applied to the eyebrows and cheeks; wild parsnip seeds and the juice of the horse-radish diluted with smooth honey assuage pain in the eyes. But whenever honey or any other juice is introduced into the remedies employed, the eye will have to be anointed all round with liquid pitch and oil to prevent its being infested with flies; for not only flies but also bees are attracted to the sweetness and odour of honey and other medicaments.

Much harm too is often caused by a leech swallowed with the drinking-water, which, fastening on the throat, sucks the blood and blocks the passage of food with its own added bulk. If the leech is in such a difficult place that it cannot be removed by hand, you should insert a pipe or reed and then pour in warm oil; for if this touches it, the leech immediately falls off.

The odour from a burnt bug may also be introduced through a pipe (for when a bug is put upon the fire and has produced smoke, the vapour given off reaches the leech through a pipe) and this vapour dislodges the leech from its clinging hold. If, however, it is attached to the stomach or intestine, it can be killed by pouring hot vinegar through a horn. Though I have prescribed these remedies to be used for oxen, most of them are certainly suitable also for all the larger kinds of cattle.

It is necessary also to construct a machine in which one can enclose beasts of burden and oxen and treat them, in order that those who are applying remedies may have readier access to their patients and that these quadrupeds, while they are actually being doctored, may not struggle and reject the remedies.

The shape of this machine is as follows: a piece of ground nine feet long and two and a half feet wide in front and four feet wide at the back is floored with boards of oak. In this space four upright posts seven feet high are placed on the right and left sides; they are set upright in the four corners and are all bound to each other with six cross-poles a to form a kind of railing, so that the animal can be driven in from the back, which is broader, as into a cage, but cannot get out on any of the other sides, because the bars get in his way and prevent him.

On the two front posts a stout yoke is placed, to which beasts of burden are fastened with halters and oxen tied by their horns, and you can also contrive here stocks, so that, when the animal's head has been inserted, bars may descend and pass through holes and the neck thus be held tight. The rest of the body, secured with nooses and stretched out, is bound to the cross-poles and is subject to the will of the person who is doctoring the animal. This machine will serve alike for all the greater quadrupeds.

Now that we have given enough instruction about oxen, it will be proper to deal next with bulls and cows. In my opinion we ought to esteem most highly bulls which have very large limbs and a calm temperament and are not too young or too old. In other respects we shall look for much the same qualities as we sought when choosing oxen. For a good bull does not differ from a gelded ox except that its expression is fierce, its appearance more animated, its horns shorter, its neck more brawny and so huge as to form the greatest part of its body; its belly is rather less developed underneath, so that it forms a straighter line and is more convenient for coupling with the female.

Cows also are most highly esteemed which are very tall and long in shape, with large bellies, very broad foreheads, eyes black and very wide-open, horns elegant, smooth and inclined to blackness, hairy ears, compressed cheek-bones, very large dewlaps and tails, hoofs of moderate size, and small legs. In other respects almost the same qualities are desirable in the females as in the males; above all things they should be young, since, when they have passed ten years, they are useless for breeding.

On the other hand they should not be covered by the bulls when they are less than two years old; if, however, they conceive before reaching two years, it is thought proper that their young should be taken from them and their udders emptied for three days that they may not feel pain, and that after that they should be kept away from the milk-pail.

You should also take care to hold an examination of your cows, as of all herds of cattle, every year; for those which have done with calf-bearing and are old, since they have ceased bearing, should be removed, and barren cows in particular, which are occupying the place of the fertile, must be got rid of or broken in to the plough; for on account of their sterility they can endure toil and work quite as well as bullocks.

This kind of cattle requires sunny pasture-ground near the sea in the winter; but in summer they like the shadiest parts of the woods or mountains and pasturage on high ground rather than in the plain; for it is better for them to feed in grassy woods and places covered with bushes and sedge-beds, since in dry, stony places their hoofs become hard. They do not require rivers and streams so much as artificial ponds, since river-water, which is generally colder, causes abortion, while rain-water is pleasanter to the taste. Cows, however, endure every outdoor cold better than horses and so can easily pass the winter under the open sky.

Enclosures must be constructed which allow ample space, so that one cow may not in narrow quarters cause abortion in another and that a feeble cow may avoid the blows of a stronger. The best cow-sheds are floored with stone or gravel, though sandy floors are also suitable, the former because they keep out rainwater, the latter because they quickly absorb it and drain it away. In either case they must be shelving, so as to make the moisture flow away, and they should face the south that they may dry easily and not be exposed to the cold winds. The care of the pasturage is a small matter; for, in order that the grass may grow more abundantly, it is usually burnt in the last part of the summer.

This makes the fodder more tender when it grows again, since the hard briers are. burnt, and it keeps down the bushes which would grow to a great height. Salt sprinkled on the stones and water-courses near the enclosures contributes to the good bodily health of the cattle and they gladly have recourse to it after they have eaten their fill, when what may be called the cowherd's signal for retreat is sounded; for this too ought always to be given at dusk, so that any cattle which have remained in the woods may be accustomed, when the horn sounds, to seek-their enclosures. Here it will be possible to pass the herd in review and its numbers can be verified, if, as though under military discipline, they occupy the quarters assigned to them by the keeper of the stalls. But the same strict rules are not imposed upon the bulls, which, relying on their strength, wander about in the woods and have free exit and return and are only recalled when they are required to cover the females.

Bulls which are less than four years old and more than twelve are prevented from mounting the females, the former because, being as it were in their infancy, they are regarded as hardly suitable for breeding purposes, the latter because they are worn out with old age.

The females are generally allowed to consort with the males in the month of July, in order that they may give birth to the young which are conceived at this time in the following spring, when the fodder has already come to perfection; for the period of gestation is ten months.

The cows do not admit the male at their owner's command but of their own accord and their natural desires coincide generally with the time of year which I have mentioned, since exhilarated by the abundance of food which the spring provides they become wanton and desire intercourse. If the female refuses intercourse or the bull feels no desire for her, the same method is employed as we shall presently prescribe for the stallion who shows distaste for the mare, namely desire is stimulated by bringing to the nostrils the odour of the genital parts. Also towards the time when the females are to be covered their food is reduced, so that excessive fatness may not render them barren, while the diet of the bulls is increased, so that they may put more energy into the sexual act.

One bull is quite enough for fifteen cows; and, when it has covered a heifer there are definite signs by which you can tell what is the sex of the offspring which it has begotten; since, if he uncouples towards the right side, it is clear that he has begotten a male, if towards the left, a female. But whether this is really true is only apparent when after one copulation the pregnant cow refuses to admit the bull again, and this actually happens only rarely; for although the cow may have conceived, she is not satisfied in her desires; so true is it that the seductive allurements of pleasure exercise the greatest power even over cattle beyond the bounds prescribed by nature.

There is no doubt that where there is a great luxuriance of fodder, a calf can be reared from the same cow every year, but, where food is scarce, the cow must be used for breeding only every other year.This rule is particularly observed where cows are employed for work, in order that, firstly, the calves may have abundance of milk for the space of a year, ' and, secondly, that a breeding cow may not have to bear the burden of work and pregnancy at the same time. When she has given birth to a calf, ' however good a mother she may be, if she is worn out by work, she denies the calf its due nourishment if her diet does not give her enough support. That is why green shrub-trefoil and toasted barley and sodden bitter-vetch are given to a cow which has borne a calf, and her tender young is given a drench of grilled millet ground up and mixed with milk. For these purposes a too it is better to procure cows from Altina,b which the inhabitants of that region call cevae. c They are of low stature and produce an abundance of milk, for which reason, if their own young are taken from them, excellent cattle can be reared at the udders of cows who are not their mothers; or if this resource is not available, the calf puts up quite well with crushed beans and wine. This plan should be adopted particularly in large herds.

Worms, which generally occur when indigestion is present, are often harmful to calves. Their feeding, therefore, must be so regulated that they digest properly; or, if they are already suffering from a malady of this kind, half-raw lupines are crushed and pellets of them thrust down their throats to serve as a drench. Wormwood a can also be ground up with dried figs and bitter-vetch and made up into pellets and thrust down their throats to act as a drench. The same effect is produced by one part of axle-grease mixed with three parts of hyssop; also the juice of horehound and of leek is effectual for killing creatures of this kind.

Mago is in favour of castrating calves while they are still young and tender, and he advises that calves, the operation should not be performed with a knife but that the testicles should be compressed with a piece of cleft fennel and gradually broken up.

He considers this to be the best method of castration, because it is applied when the animal is still tender and causes no wound. When the animal has grown tougher, it is better that it should be castrated as a two-year-old than as a one-year-old. He recommends that the operation should take place in the spring or in the autumn when the moon is waning, and that the calf should be bound in the machine b; then, before applying the knife, you should seize between two narrow laths of wood, as in a forceps, the sinews of the testicles, which the Greeks call hangers, because the genital parts hang from them, and then take hold of the testicles and lay them open with a knife and after pressing them out cut them off in such a way that their extremities are left adhering to the said sinews.

By this method the steer runs no danger from an eruption of blood, nor is it likely to lose its masculinity and become totally effeminate, and it keeps the form of a male when it has been deprived of generative power.

This, however, it does not lose immediately; for, if you allow it to cover a cow directly after the operation, it is certain that it is possible for it to beget offspring; but it should by no means be allowed to do so, lest it die from a flux of blood. The wounds should be anointed with the ash of brushwood and litharge of silver, and the animal should be kept away from water for that day and be fed on only a little food. For the three following days it should be treated as a sick animal and tempted to eat with the tops of trees and green fodder cut off for it and must not be allowed to drink much. It is thought right also to anoint the actual sores after three days with liquid pitch and ashes mixed with a little oil, so that they may scar over more quickly and that they may not be infested by flies. I have now said enough about oxen.

For those whose pleasure it is to rear horses it is of the utmost importance to provide a painstaking overseer and plenty of fodder; both these points can be neglected up to a certain point in dealing with other domestic animals. A stud of horses, however, requires the most assiduous attention and a generous diet. Horses themselves fall into three classes.

There is the noble stock which supplies horses for the circus and the Sacred Games; then there is the stock used for breeding mules which in the price which its offspring fetches is a match for the noble breed; and there is the common breed which produces ordinary mares and horses. The more excellent each class is, the richer must be the pasturage assigned to it.

The feeding-grounds chosen for herds of horses must be spacious and marshy, mountainous, well-watered and. never dry, empty rather than encumbered by many tree-trunks, and producing an abundance of soft rather than tall grass. The stallions and mares of the common stock are allowed to be pastured everywhere together, and no fixed seasons are observed for breeding.

The stallions of the noble stock will be put to the mares about the time of the spring equinox, so that the mares may be able to rear their offspring with little trouble, when the pasture is rich and grassy, at the same season a year later as that at which they conceived them; for they give birth to their young in the twelfth month. The greatest care, therefore, must be taken that at the said time of year every opportunity is given equally to mares as to their stallions to couple if they desire to do so, because, if you prevent them from doing so, horses beyond all animals are excited by the fury of their lust. (Hence the term " horse-madness " is given to the poison which kindles in human beings a passion like the desire in horses.) Indeed, in some regions, there is no doubt that the mares are affected by such a burning desire for intercourse, that, even though there is no stallion at hand, owing to their continuous and excessive passion, by imagining in their own minds the pleasures of love they become pregnant with wind, just as farmyard hens produce wind-eggs. Indeed the poet is not indulging his fancy too much when he says: a

But, beyond all furies, wondrous is the rage

Of mares;

Love leads them over Gargara b And o'er Ascanius' c loudly roaring stream; They scale the mountain and through rivers swim, Soon as the flame has reached their craving marrow (More so in spring, for then the heat returns And warms their bones) all on high rocks they stand

Facing the west, and the light breezes catch, And oft with wind conceive, without the aid Of union—a wondrous tale to tell! d

For it is also well-known that on the Holy Mountain of Spain,e which runs westward near the Ocean, mares have often become pregnant without coition and reared their offspring, which, however, is of no use, because it is snatched away by death at three years of age, before it can come to maturity.

Therefore, as I have said, we shall take care that the broodmares are not tormented by their natural desires about the time of the spring equinox. But during the rest of the year the valuable stallions should be kept away from the mares, so that they do not cover them whenever they wish, nor, if they are prevented from doing so, harm themselves through excitement due to their desires.

It is better, therefore, either to banish a stallion in some distant pasture or else keep it shut up in the stables; then at the time when it is summoned by the mare, it should be fortified by a generous diet, and with the approach of spring should be fattened on barley and bitter-vetch, so that it may be equal to the fatigues of intercourse, and that, the stronger it is when it covers the mare, the greater may be the sexual vigour which it communicates to its future descendants. Some authorities also prescribe that one should fatten up a stallion by the method used for mules, so that, exhilarated by this condition, it may suffice for a number of mares.

However, one stallion ought to be able to impregnate not less than fifteen and on the other hand not more than twenty mares, and is generally suitable to breeding purposes from three years of age to twenty. But if a stallion is disinclined for intercourse, he can be roused by the odour of a sponge, with which the parts of the mare have been wiped, applied to his nostrils. On the other hand, if the mare refuses to submit to the stallion, her parts are anointed with crushed squill, and this kindles her desire. Sometimes, too, a badly-bred ordinary horse is used to arouse in the mare a longing for copulation; for, when he has approached her and, so to speak, invited her compliance, he is led away and the better-bred horse is mated with the now more complaisant mare.

From the time when mares become pregnant they need special care and must be fortified by generous fodder.If the grass has failed owing to the cold of winter, they should be kept under cover and not be fatigued by work or journeys, and they should not be exposed to the cold nor enclosed in a narrow space lest they should cause one another to miscarry; for all these unfavourable conditions cause abortion.

But if a mare has suffered either in producing its offspring or from abortion, polypody crushed and mixed with tepid water, and administered through a horn will serve as a remedy. If, on the other hand, all goes well, the foal must on no account be touched with the hand, for even the lightest contact is harmful.

All that one will have to do is to take care that the foal lives with its mother in a place which is both roomy and warm, so that the cold may not hurt it while it is still weak and that its mother may not crush it because its quarters are narrow. Then gradually it will have to be made to leave the stable, and care must be taken that it does not burn its hoofs with dung. Soon, when it has become stronger, it must be sent out to the same pasture as its mother, so that the latter may not be afflicted through longing for its offspring; for this kind of animal especially suffers through its love for its young, if it have not the opportunity for indulging it. An ordinary mare is in the habit of bearing a foal every year; but a well-bred mare ought to be pregnant in alternate years, in order that, receiving greater strength from its mother's milk, the foal may be prepared for the toil of the contests.

It is generally thought that a stallion is not suitable for breeding purposes before it is three years old, and that it can continue to procreate until its twentieth year, but that it is all right for a mare to conceive at the age of two years, so that it is three years old when it bears and rears its young, and it is also considered to be of no use after the tenth year, because the offspring of an aged mother is slow and lazy. Democritus declares that it will rest with us whether a male or a female is conceived, since he directs us, if we wish that a male should be begotten, to tie up the stallion's left testicle with a flaxen cord or some other material, and the right testicle if we want a female offspring; and he thinks that the same method should be adopted with almost all other cattle.

As soon as a foal is born, it is possible to judge its natural qualities immediately. If it is good-humoured, if it is courageous, if it is not alarmed by the sight or sound of something unfamiliar, if it runs in front of the herd, if it surpasses its age-mates in playfulness and activity on various occasions and when competing in a race, if it leaps over a ditch and crosses a bridge on a river without baulking—these are the signs of generous mettle.

Its physical form will consist of a small head, dark eyes, wide-open nostrils, short, upstanding ears, a neck which is soft and broad without being long, a thick mane which hangs down on the right side, a broad chest covered with well-proportioned muscles, the shoulders big and straight, the flanks arched, the back-bone double, the belly drawn in, the testicles well matched and small, the loins broad and sunken, the tail long and covered with bristling, curly hair, the legs soft and tall and straight, the knee tapering and small and not turned inwards, the buttocks round, the haunches brawny and well-proportioned, the hoofs hard, high, hollow and round with moderately large crowns above them; the whole body must be so formed as to be large, tall and erect, and also active in appearance and, in spite of its length, rounded as far as its shape allows.

As regards character, those horses are esteemed which are roused to activity after being quiet and become very mild again after being roused; for such animals are found to be both amenable to discipline and very ready to take part in public contests and the effort which they require. At two years of age a horse is suitable to be trained for domestic purposes; but, if it is to be trained for racing, it should have completed three years, and provided that it is entered for this kind of effort only after its fourth year. a

The signs which mark a horse's age change with its physical changes. For when it is two years and six months old, its middle teeth, both the upper and the lower, fall out. In the course of its fourth year the so-called canine teeth are shed and it grows new ones in their place; then, before the end of its sixth year the upper and lower molars fall out, and in the course of the sixth year it makes up the number of the first set of teeth which it has changed; in the seventh year the whole set is completed, and henceforward the animal has some hollow teeth; and, subsequently, it is impossible to ascertain with certainty what its age is. In its tenth year, however, its temples begin to sink and its eyebrows sometimes begin to turn white and its teeth to project. I think I have said enough on the subject of the horse's disposition, character, physique and age. My next business is to set forth the way to look after horses in health and sickness.

If a horse is thin without being ill, it can be restored to condition more quickly with roasted wheat than with barley; but it must also be given wine to drink, and then by degrees foods of this kind must be reduced by mixing bran with barley until it becomes accustomed to a diet of beans and pure barley.

The bodies of horses require a daily rubbing down just as much as those of human beings, and often to massage a horse's back with the pressure of the hand does more good than if you were to provide it most generously with food. Chaff ought to be spread on the ground where horses stand. It is also very important to maintain the vigour in their bodies and feet; we shall secure both these objects if we conduct the herd at suitable times to their stable, to their watering-place and to exercise, and if care is taken that they are stabled in a dry place, so that their hoofs are not wetted. This we shall easily avoid if the stable is floored with boards of hard wood, or if the ground is carefully cleaned from time to time and chaff thrown over it.

Beasts of burden generally fall ill from fatigue or from the heat, and sometimes also from the cold and when they have not passed urine at the proper time, or if they sweat and then drink immediately after having been in violent motion, or when they are suddenly spurred into a gallop after they have stood for a long time.

Rest is the cure for fatigue, provided that oil or fat mixed with wine is poured down the throat. For a chill, fomentations are applied, and the loins moistened with heated oil, and the head and spine soaked with tepid fat or ointment. If the animal does not pass urine, the remedies are almost the same; for oil mixed with wine is poured over the flanks and loins, and if this has not produced the desired effect, a small suppository made of boiled honey and salt is applied to the orifice from which the urine flows, or a live fly or a grain of incense or a suppository of bitumen is inserted in the genital organs.

The same remedies will be applied, if the urine has scalded these organs. Head-aches are indicated by tears which flow from the eyes and the hanging down of the ears, and the neck and head which are weighed down and droop towards the ground.

In these circumstances the vein under the eyes is opened and the mouth fomented with hot water and the animal is kept away from food for the first day. Then on the next day, before it has eaten anything, it is given a drink of tepid water and some green grass; then a litter of old hay or soft straw is spread under it and, at dusk, water is again given and a little barley with haulm of vetch, so that by means of small doses the animal may be brought back to regular forms of food. If a horse's jaws give it pain, they should be fomented with hot vinegar and rubbed with old axle-grease, and the same remedy should be applied if the jaws are swollen.

If it has damaged its shoulders or has had an extravasation of blood to these parts, the veins somewhere near the middle of each leg should be opened and the shoulders should be anointed with a mixture of incense-dust and the blood which flows from the wound, and, that the animal may not be unduly weakened, some of its own ordure should be applied to the bleeding veins and bound with bandages. On the following day blood should again be drawn from the same places and the same treatment given, and the animal should be kept away from barley and only given a little hay. After three days and until the sixth day the juice of a leek to the quantity of about three cyathi mixed with a hemina of oil should be poured down its throat through a horn.

After the sixth day it should be made to walk slowly and, after it has taken this exercise, it will be a good plan to drive it into a pond so that it may swim; then, by the administration by degrees of a more solid diet, it will be brought back to normal conditions. If a horse is troubled by bile and its belly swells and it cannot get rid of wind, the hand is greased and inserted into its bowel and the natural exits which have been blocked are opened up; afterwards, when the ordure has been removed, ox-marjoram and lousewort crushed up with salt are mixed with boiled-down honey, so as to form a suppository, and inserted from below; these move the belly and bring away all the bile.

Some people pour down the throat a quadrans of ground myrrh in a hemina of wine and anoint the anus with liquid pitch; others wash out the bowel with sea-water, still others with fresh brine.

Tape-worms and maw-worms, too, often do harm to the intestines. It is a sign of their presence when horses roll about on the ground in internal pain or bring heads near their bellies or frequently flick their tails. An efficacious remedy is that described above, namely, the insertion of the hand and the removal of ordure followed by the washing out of the bowel with salt water or hard brine, and afterwards the pouring down the throat of the root of the caper-tree ground up with a sextarius of vinegar; for by this method the animals mentioned above are killed.

When any animal is sick, deep litter must be provided, so that it may have a softer resting-place. A cough which has only just begun is quickly cured with crushed lentils separated from the pods and pounded into minute fragments. When this has been done, a sextarius of hot water is mixed with the same quantity of lentils and poured down the animal's throat; the same treatment is continued for three days and the sick animal is strengthened by a diet of green grass and tree-tops. A cough of long standing can be dispelled by pouring down the throat on several days three cyathi of leek-juice in a kemina of oil and providing the same diet as we have prescribed above.

Skin-eruptions and any form of scab are rubbed with vinegar and alum. Sometimes, if these sores persist, they are anointed with equal quantities of soda and split alum mixed together in vinegar. Pustules are scraped with a curry-comb in very hot sunlight until blood is made to flow, then equal portions of the root of wild ivy, sulphur and liquid pitch are mixed with alum. The aforesaid ailments are treated with this medicament.

Sores due to chafing are washed twice a day with hot water, and then they are rubbed with salt powdered and boiled with fat until the blood flows.

Scabies is fatal to this kind of quadruped, unless help is speedily given. If the attack is only slight, in the first stages the sores should be anointed in burning sunlight with cedar-oil or mastic-gum or nettle seed and oil crushed together or the fish-oil which is deposited on dishes by salted tunnies. The fat of the sea-calf is particularly efficacious against this malady. If, however, the trouble is of long standing, more violent remedies are needed; and so bitumen and sulphur and hellebore mixed with liquid pitch and stale axle-grease in equal quantities are boiled together, and the patients treated with this preparation, the sores having been previously scraped with a knife and thoroughly washed with urine.

Often, too, it has been found beneficial to cut the scab to the quick with a lancet and remove it and to treat the resulting sores with liquid pitch and oil, which both cleanse the wounds and cause them to fill up; when they have filled, soot from a brazen vessel rubbed into the sore will be found most beneficial in causing the wounds to scar over and grow hair.

We shall get rid of the flies which infest wounds by pouring on them pitch and oil or fat. The other kinds of sores are correctly treated with the flour of bitter-vetch. Scars on the eyes are reduced by rubbing with fasting spittle and salt or with the shell of a cuttle-fish pounded up with mineral salt or with the seed of the wild parsnip crushed and squeezed through linen over the eyes.

Any kind of pain in the eyes is quickly alleviated by anointing them with the juice of the plantain mixed with honey obtained without smoking out the bees, or, if this is not available, at any rate with thyme-honey. Sometimes bleeding at the nose has proved dangerous and has been stopped by pouring the juice of green coriander into the nostrils.

A horse sometimes languishes through distaste for food. The remedy for this is a kind of seed called git,a two cyathi of which are crushed and dissolved in three cyathi of oil and one sextarius of wine and poured down the throat. Nausea can also be stopped by frequently giving the animal a bruised head of garlic in a hemina of wine to drink. It is better to open up an abscess with a red-hot metal plate than with a cold iron instrument, and when the pus has been squeezed out, it is dressed with lint.

There is also a pestilential malady the effect of which is that mares are attacked with sudden emaciation and carried off by death in the course of a few days. When this comes on, it is beneficial to pour four sextarii of fish-pickle into the nostrils of each victim if it be of small stature, one congius if it be of larger size. This remedy draws away all the phlegm through the nostrils and purges the animal.

There is a form of madness which comes over mares and is rare but remarkable, namely, that if they have seen their reflexion in the water, they are seized with a vain passion and consequently forget to eat and die from a wasting disease due to love.

It is a sign of this form of insanity when they rush about over their pastures as though they were goaded on and at times seem to be looking about them and seeking and missing something. This delusion is dispelled if you cut off her mane unevenly and lead her down to the water; then beholding at length her own ugliness, she loses the recollection of the picture which was formerly before her eyes. What I have now remarked with regard to mares in general must suffice; special instructions must now be given for those who devote themselves to breeding droves of mules.

For the rearing of mules it is of the utmost importance to seek out and examine the male and female which are to be the parents of the future offspring; for if one of them is not suitable to the other, the result of their union is a failure.

A mare should be chosen which is between four and ten years of age, physically very big and handsome, with stout limbs and well able to endure toil, that she may receive and bear in her womb an alien offspring of another race planted within her and confer on her progeny not only her good physical qualities but also her natural disposition.

For not only are the seeds, which are injected into the genital parts, with difficulty quickened into life but also after conception they take longer to mature into the creature which is to be born, and it is only after the completion of a year that in the thirteenth month the offspring is brought forth with difficulty, and more of the sluggishness of the father is inherent in the offspring than the vigour of the mother. Nevertheless, while mares for breeding mules are less trouble to find, the task of selecting the male parent is greater, for often experience disappoints the judgment of the man who has to choose it.

Many stallions which are admirable as far as appearance goes procreate offspring which are very inferior either in physique or sexual qualities—for if they produce she-mules of small size or more males than females of fine physique, they diminish the income of the proprietor of the estate—while some stallions which ' have been despised on account of their appearance are productive of the most valuable progeny. It sometimes happens that a stallion displays his high quality in his offspring but is sluggish in taking his pleasure and can be only very seldom induced to have intercourse. Owners of studs stimulate the senses of such a stallion by bringing up to him a female of the same race as himself,0 since nature has made like more at home with like; then, when by putting the ass a in his way, they have lured on the stallion which has thrown himself upon her, while he is as it were inflamed and blinded by desire, they take away the ass, which he had wanted, and put him to the mare which he had scorned.

There is another type of stallion which is mad to gratify his lust and brings ruin on the stud unless cunning is used to restrain him, for he often breaks his bonds and disturbs the pregnant mares and, when he covers them, inflicts bites on their necks and backs.

To prevent this he is harnessed for a time to a mill and tempers the fierceness of his passion with hard work and is only put to the mare when he has moderated his desires. Nor indeed should a stallion of milder passions be allowed to. cover a mare under any other conditions, since it is very important that the naturally slumbering temperament of the animal should be stirred up and excited by moderate exercise and that the male should be put to the female when he has become more animated, in order that the seed itself, in virtue of some secret force, may be fashioned by more active elements.

A mule can be bred not only from a mare and a donkey, but also from an ass and a horse, and further from a wild ass and a mare.

Indeed some authors, who ought not to be passed over in silence, such as Marcus Varro b and, before him, Dionysius c and Mago, have related that in some regions of Africa the production of offspring by mules is so far from being considered a prodigy that their offspring is as familiar to the inhabitants as those born from mares are to us. There is, however, nothing in the way of a mule superior either in disposition or in form to that begotten by a male ass, though up to a certain point the progeny of a wild ass can be compared to it, except that, being both difficult to train and rebellious against servitude, it exhibits the wild character and lean condition of its sire.

A stallion, therefore, of this kind is more useful for the production of descendants in the second than in the first generation; for, when the offspring of a she-ass and a wild ass is put to a mare, the ferocity of the wild animal has been broken down, and any offspring of this union reproduces the form and mild temper of its sire and the strength and quickness of its grand-sire. The progeny conceived and procreated from a horse and an ass, though they have derived their name of " hinny " from their sire,a show in every respect a greater resemblance to their dam; it is, therefore, most advantageous to choose a donkey as sire for a race of mules whose appearance, as I have said, is proved by experience to be handsomer.

However, from the point of view of appearance, it ought not to be approved unless it has an ample stature, a strong neck, robust and broad flanks, a vast and muscular chest, brawny thighs, solid legs and a black or spotted coat; for a mouse-colour, as it is commonplace in a donkey, is not very suitable in a mule either.

We must not let the general appearance of this quadruped deceive us if we see that it is such as we approve of; for just as the spots on the tongue and palates of rams are generally found repeated on the fleeces of the lambs which they sire, so if a donkey has different coloured hairs on its eyelids or ears, it often sires an offspring of diverse colouring also; and this colouring, although the stallion was most carefully examined to see if it was present, is often a cause of disappointment to the owner. For sometimes also a stallion shapes mules very different from himself in respects other than the signs mentioned above. This, I think, occurs for no other reason than that the colour of the grandsire is transmitted to the second generation mixed with the elements which form the seed.

As soon as the foal of the ass, such as I have described, is brought to birth, it should be taken away from its mother and put under a mare who has no knowledge of it.

This deception is best carried out in dark conditions; for if her offspring has been taken away from her in a dark place and the aforesaid foal is put under her it is nourished by her as if it were her own offspring; and then, when she has become accustomed to it for ten days, she henceforward always gives it her dugs whenever it wants to feed. The future stallion fed in this manner learns to have an affection for mares. Sometimes also, although it has been reared on its own mother's milk, if it has lived familiarly amongst mares from its tender years it may well seek their company. It must not, however, be allowed to cover them when it is less than three years old, and when it is permitted to do so, it will be well that intercourse should take place in the spring, since it will have to be fortified with chopped green fodder and an abundance of barley and sometimes also given a drench. It ought not, however, to be put-to a young mare; for unless she has already had experience of a male, she repulses the donkey with her hoofs when he leaps upon her, and the affront which he has received inspires him furthermore with an aversion for all other mares. To prevent this, a badly-bred, ordinary donkey is brought to seek her compliance; he should not, however, be allowed to cover her, but if the mare is inclined to submit to his desires, the more ignoble donkey is promptly driven away and the mare is covered by the valuable stallion.

A special place is constructed for these purposes— the countryfolk call it a " machine " a—it consists of two lateral walls built into gently-rising ground, having a narrow space between them, so that the mare cannot struggle or turn away from the donkey when he tries to mount her.

There is an entrance at each end, that on the lower level being provided with cross-bars, to which the mare is fastened with a halter. and stands with her forefeet at the bottom of the slope, so that, leaning forward she may the better receive the insemination of the donkey and make it easier for a quadruped smaller than herself to mount upon her back from the higher ground..When the mare has given birth to a foal of which the donkey is the sire, she rears it during the following year without being with foal again. This method is better than that which some people follow, who cause her to be covered again by the stallion and to be with foal, although she has only just foaled. When a she-mule is a year old, it is right to take it away from its dam and put it to feed far away in the mountains or in wild places, so that it may harden its hoofs and presently be fit for long journeys. Now the male is better than the female mule for carrying a pack-saddle, whereas the latter is more nimble; but both sexes step out well on a journey and are useful for breaking up the soil, unless the price of the animal is too burdensome an expense for the farmer, or a soil, being of heavy sod, demands the strength of oxen.

Though, in dealing with other classes of animals, I have already described most of the medicines which mules require, I will not omit to mention certain maladies which are peculiar to these animals, the remedies for which I have here subjoined.

If a mule is in heat, raw cabbage is administered; if it is asthmatic, blood is drawn off and about a hemina of the juice of horehound mixed with a sextarius of wine and half an ounce of oil of frankincense is poured down its throat. If it is suffering from spavin, barley-flour is applied, and then the suppuration is opened with a lancet and dressed with lint, or else a sextarius of the best fish-pickle in a pound of oil is poured through the left nostril; the whites of three or four eggs from which the yolks have been separated are mixed with this medicament.

Blood-blisters round the ankles are usually cut and sometimes cauterized. When blood flows down into the feet, it is drawn off by the same method as is applied to horses, or, if the herb which the countryfolk call veratrum a is available, it is given as fodder. Another remedy is henbane, the seed of which, crushed and administered with wine, cures this malady.

Emaciation and languor are dispelled by frequent potions containing half an ounce of sulphur?a raw egg and a denarius weight of myrrh; these are beaten up and mixed in wine and then poured down the animal's throat. The same ingredients serve equally well as a remedy for a cough and for pain in the stomach. For emaciation nothing is as efficacious as lucerne b; this herb, when it is green, quickly fattens beasts of burden, and is not slow in doing so even when it is dry and used instead of hay, but it must be given in moderation, lest the animal be choked by an excess of blood. When a mule is exhausted and feeling the heat, fat is thrust down its throat and wine poured into its mouth. In all other respects in dealing with mules we shall follow the method which we have prescribed in the earlier parts of this book which deal with the care of oxen and horses.