There are some persons who are of opinion that the best method of manuring land is to pen sheep there, with nets erected to prevent them from straying. If land is not manured, it will get chilled; but if, on the other hand, it is over-manured, it becomes burnt up: it is a much better plan, too, to manure little and often than in excess. The warmer the soil is by nature, the less manure it requires.
CHAP. 54. (24.)—HOW TO ASCERTAIN THE QUALITY OF SEED.
The best seed of all is that which is of the last year’s growth. That which is two years old is inferior, and three the worst of all—beyond that, it is unproductive.[386] The same definite rule which applies to one kind of seed is applicable to them all: the seed which falls to the bottom[387] on the threshing-floor, should be reserved for sowing, for being the most weighty it is the best in quality: there is no better method, in fact, of ascertaining its quality. The grains of those ears which have intervals between the seed should be rejected. The best grain is that which has a reddish hue,[388] and which, when broken between the teeth, presents the same[389] colour; that which has more white within is of inferior quality. It is a well-known fact that some lands require more seed than others, from which circumstance first arose a superstition that exists among the peasantry; it is their belief that when the ground demands the seed with greater avidity than usual, it is famished, and devours the grain. It is consistent with reason to put in the seed where the soil is humid sooner than elsewhere, to prevent the grain from rotting in the rain: on dry spots it should be sown later, and just before the fall of a shower, so that it may not have to lie long without germinating and so come to nothing. When the seed is put in early it should be sown thick, as it is a considerable time before it germinates; but when it is put in later, it should be sown thinly, to prevent it from being suffocated. There is a certain degree of skill, too, required in scattering the seed evenly; to ensure this, the hand must keep time[390] with the step, moving always with the right foot. There are certain persons, also, who have a secret method[391] of their own, having been born[392] with a happy hand which imparts fruitfulness to the grain. Care should be taken not to sow seed in a warm locality which has been grown in a cold one, nor should the produce of an early soil be sown in a late one. Those who give advice to the contrary have quite misapplied their pains.
CHAP. 55.—WHAT QUANTITY OF EACH KIND OF GRAIN IS REQUISITE FOR SOWING A JUGERUM.
[393] In a soil of middling quality, the proper proportion of seed is five modii of wheat or winter-wheat to the jugerum, ten of spelt or of seed-wheat—that being the name which we have mentioned[394] as being given to one kind of wheat—six of barley, one-fifth more of beans than of wheat, twelve of vetches, three of chick-pease, chicheling vetches, and pease, ten of lupines, three of lentils—(these last, however, it is said, must be sown with dry manure)—six of fitches, six of fenugreek, four of kidney-beans, twenty of hay grass,[395] and four sextarii of millet and panic. Where the soil is rich, the proportion must be greater, where it is thin, less.[396]
There is another distinction, too, to be made; where the soil is dense, cretaceous, or moist, there should be six modii of wheat or winter-wheat to the jugerum, but where the land is loose, dry, and prolific, four will be enough. A meagre soil, too, if the crop is not very thinly sown, will produce a diminutive, empty ear. Rich lands give a number of stalks to each grain, and yield a thick crop from only a light sowing. The result, then, is, that from four to six modii must be sown, according to the nature of the soil; though there are some who make it a rule that five modii is the proper proportion for sowing, neither more nor less, whether it is a densely-planted locality, a declivity, or a thin, meagre soil. To this subject bears reference an oracular precept which never can be too carefully observed[397]—“Don’t rob the harvest.”[398] Attius, in his Praxidicus,[399] has added that the proper time for sowing is, when the moon is in Aries, Gemini, Leo, Libra, and Aquarius. Zoroaster says it should be done when the sun has passed twelve degrees of Scorpio, and the moon is in Taurus.
CHAP. 56.—THE PROPER TIMES FOR SOWING.
We now come to a subject which has been hitherto deferred by us, and which requires our most careful attention—the proper times for sowing. This is a question that depends in a very great degree upon the stars; and I shall therefore make it my first care to set forth all the opinions that have been written in reference to the subject. Hesiod, the first writer who has given any precepts upon agriculture, speaks of one period only for sowing—the setting of the Vergiliæ: but then he wrote in Bœotia, a country of Hellas, where, as we have already stated,[400] they are still in the habit of sowing at that period.
It is generally agreed by the most correct writers, that with the earth, as with the birds and quadrupeds, there are certain impulses for reproduction; and the epoch for this is fixed by the Greeks at the time when the earth is warm and moist. Virgil[401] says that wheat and spelt should be sown at the setting of the Vergiliæ, barley between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice, and vetches,[402] kidney-beans, and lentils at the setting of Boötes:[403] it is of great importance, therefore, to ascertain the exact days of the rising and setting of these constellations, as well as of the others. There are some, again, who recommend the sowing to be done before the setting of the Vergiliæ, but only in a dry soil, and in those provinces where the weather is hot; for the seed, they say,[404] if put in the ground will keep, there being no moisture to spoil it, and within a single day after the next fall of rain, will make its appearance above ground. Others, again, are of opinion that sowing should begin about seven days after the setting of the Vergiliæ, a period which is mostly followed by rain. Some think that cold soils should be sown immediately after the autumnal equinox, and a warm soil later, so that the blade may not put forth too luxuriantly before winter.
It is universally agreed, however, that the sowing should not be done about the period of the winter solstice; for this very good reason—the winter seeds, if put in before the winter solstice, will make their appearance above ground on the seventh day, whereas, if they are sown just after it, they will hardly appear by the fortieth. There are some, however, who begin very early, and have a saying to justify their doing so, to the effect that if seed sown too early often disappoints, seed put in too late always does so. On the other hand, again, there are some who maintain that it is better to sow in spring than in a bad autumn; and they say that if they find themselves obliged to sow in spring, they would choose the period that intervenes between the prevalence of the west winds[405] and the vernal equinox. Some persons, however, take no notice of the celestial phenomena, and only regulate their movements by the months. In spring they put in flax, the oat, and the poppy, up to the feast of the Quinquatria,[406] as we find done at the present day by the people of Italy beyond the Padus. There, too, they sow beans and winter-wheat in the month of November, and spelt at the end of September, up to the ides of October:[407] others, however, sow this last after the ides of October, as late as the calends of November.[408]