Douglas, p. 64.
[1734]. Cato, 134.
[1735]. The harvest began earlier in Salamis than in the neighbourhood of Athens. Theoph. Hist. Plant. viii. 2. 11. Chandler, vol. ii. p. 230. In Egypt barley was reaped on the sixth month after sowing, and wheat on the seventh. Theoph. Hist. Plant. viii. 2. 7. In Greece, barley required seven or eight months to ripen; wheat still more. This latter grain came to maturity more speedily in Sicily, and returned thirty-fold. § 8. In a district in the island of Rhodes they reaped barley twice in the year. § 9. Harvest was thirty days earlier in Attica than in the Hellespont. 8. 10. There was a kind of wheat in Eubœa which ripened very early; and there was introduced from Sicily into Achaia another kind which was fit for the sickle in two months. Id. viii. 4. 4. Wheat returned in Babylonia, even to negligent husbandmen, fifty-fold, and to such as properly cultivated their lands, a hundred-fold. Id. viii. 7. 4.
[1736]. Dem. De Cor. § 16.
[1737]. Or perhaps wholly so when they happened to be inhabitants of the warm lowlands on the sea-shore and valleys. At least this is the opinion of Hesiod who counsels the husbandman, γυμνὸν σπείρειν, γυμνὸν δὲ βοωτεῖν, γυμνὸν δ᾽ ἀμάαν, εἴ χ’ ὥρια πάντ᾽ ἐθέλησθα ἔργα κομίζεσθαι Δημήτερος. Opp. et Dies, 391, sqq.
Aristophanes alludes to the same custom. Lysist. 1175.
Ἥδη γεωργεῖν γυμνὸς, ἀποδὺς βούλομαι. And Virgil. “Nudus ara, sere nudus,” Georg, i. 299, upon which Servius remarks: “Non dicit nudum esse debere, quasi aliter non oporteat aut possit; sed sub tanta serenitate dicit hæc agenda, ut et amictus possit contemni.” Be this, however, as it may, the precept of Hesiod and Virgil is literally observed in Egypt, where the rustics often perform their labour stark naked.
[1738]. Il. λ. 67, seq.
[1739]. Πότερα οὖν τέμνεις, ἔφη, στὰς ἔνθα πνεῖ ἄνεμος, ἢ ἀντίος· οὐκ ἀντίος, ἔφην, ἔγωγε· χαλεπὸν γὰρ, οἶμαι, καὶ τοῖς ὄμμασι καὶ ταῖς χερσὶ γίγνεται, ἀντιον ἀχύρων καὶ ἀθέρων θερίζειν. Xenoph. Œconom. xviii. 1.
[1740]. σ. 550, seq.