Here Atticus looked around as if to enquire whether he had omitted any thing.
"This is the silence," said I, "which summons another player on the boards."
Of shepherds
X. "The rest of this act," I added, "relates to how many and what kind of shepherds are necessary."
Cossinius took the cue. "For large cattle," he said, "men of full age are required; for small cattle boys will do: but in either case those who drive their flocks and herds on the drift ways must be stouter than those who remain on the farm and return to the steading every day.
"So in the wood pastures (saltus) it behooves one to have young men and usually armed men, while on the farm boys or even girls may tend the flock. Those who use the distant feeding grounds should require their shepherds to feed their flocks together all day, but at night to remain each one with his own flock. They should all be under the supervision of one flock master, who should be older and more experienced than the others, because they will obey more cheerfully one who surpasses them in age and knowledge; and yet the flock master should be of such years that he may not be prevented by age from hard work: for neither old men nor boys can endure the steeps of the drift ways, nor the ardours and roughness of the mountains, which must be suffered by those who follow flocks, especially cattle and goats, to whom the rocks and the forests are pleasant grazing places.
"So far as concerns the conformation of the men chosen for these occupations, they should be strong and swift and active, with ready limbs not only able to follow the cattle but to defend them from the incursions of wild beasts and of brigands: men who can load the packs on the sumpter beasts: can run and throw a javelin.[148]
"Every nation is not fit for tending cattle, especially the Basculi and the Turduli [of Spain]. The Gauls are the best of all, particularly for draught cattle.
"In the matter of the purchase of shepherds, there are six usual methods of obtaining lawful title to a slave: (i) by inheritance, (2) by due form of mancipation, which is delivery of possession by one who has the legal right, (3) by the legal process called surrender in court (cessio in jure) from one who has that right, the transfer taking place where it should, (4) by prescriptive use (usucapion), (5) by purchase of a prisoner of war "under the crown" (6) by auction at the distribution of some one's property by order of court under the process known as bonorum emptio.[149]
"The peculium or personal property of the slave usually passes with him to a new master unless it is specially excepted in the terms of sale: there is also the usual guaranty as to the health of the slave and that he has committed no theft or tort for which his master is legally responsible, and, unless the purchase is by mancipation, the bargain is bound by an obligation of double indemnity, or in the amount of the purchase price alone, if that is the agreement.