fellow- man. For there is nought which earth displays with intent to deceive, but in clear and simple language stamped with the seal of truth she informs us what she can and cannot do.[13] Thus it has ever seemed to me that earth is the best discoverer of true honesty,[14] in that she offers all her stores of knowledge in a shape accessible to the learner, so that he who runs may read. Here it is not open to the sluggard, as in other arts, to put forward the plea of ignorance or lack of knowledge, for all men know that earth, if kindly treated, will repay in kind. No! there is no witness[15] against a coward soul so clear as that of husbandry;[16] since no man ever yet persuaded himself that he could live without the staff of life. He therefore that is unskilled in other money-making arts and will not dig, shows plainly he is minded to make his living by picking and stealing, or by begging alms, or else he writes himself down a very fool.[17]
[12] Or, 'this fair earth herself.'
[13] Or, 'earth our mother reveals her powers and her impotence.'
[14] Lit. 'of the good and the bad.' Cf. Dem. 'adv. Phorm.' 918. 18.
[15] Lit. 'no accuser of.' Cf. Aesch. 'Theb.' 439.
[16] Reading, with Sauppe, {all' e georgia}, or if, with Jacobs, {e en georgia argia}, transl. 'as that of idleness in husbandry.'
[17] Or, 'if not, he must be entirely irrational.' Cf. Plat. 'Apol.' 37 C.
Presently, Ischomachus proceeded: Now it is of prime importance,[18] in reference to the profitableness or unprofitableness of agriculture, even on a large estate where there are numerous[19] workfolk,[20] whether a man takes any pains at all to see that his labourers are devoted to the work on hand during the appointed time,[21] or whether he neglects that duty. Since one man will fairly distance ten[22] simply by working at the time, and another may as easily fall short by leaving off before the hour.[23] In fact, to let the fellows take things easily the whole day through will make a difference easily of half in the whole work.[24]
[18] Lit. 'it made a great difference, he said, with regard to profit and loss in agriculture.'
[19] Or if, after Hertlein, adding {kai meionon}, transl. 'workmen now more, now less, in number.'
[20] {ergasteron}, 'poet.' L. S. cf. 'Orph. H.' 65. 4. See above, v. 15; xiii. 10.
[21] Cf. Herod. II. ii. 2.
[22] Or, 'Why! one man in ten makes all the difference by . . .' {para} = 'by comparison with.'
[23] Reading as vulg., or if {to me pro k.t.l.} transl. 'by not leaving off, etc.'
[24] i.e. 'is a difference of fifty per cent on the whole work.'
As, on a walking-expedition, it may happen, of two wayfarers, the one will gain in pace upon the other half the distance say in every five- and-twenty miles,[25] though both alike are young and hale of body. The one, in fact, is bent on compassing the work on which he started, he steps out gaily and unflinchingly; the other, more slack in spirit, stops to recruit himself and contemplate the view by fountain side and shady nook, as though his object were to court each gentle zephyr. So in farm work; there is a vast difference as regards performance between those who do it not, but seek excuse for idleness and are suffered to be listless. Thus, between good honest work and base neglect there is as great a difference as there is between--what shall I say?--why, work and idleness.[26] The gardeners, look, are hoeing vines to keep them clean and free of weeds; but they hoe so sorrily that the loose stuff grows ranker and more plentiful. Can you call that[27] anything but idleness?
[25] Lit. 'per 200 stades.'
[26] Or, 'wholly to work and wholly to be idle.' Reading as Sauppe, etc., or if with Holden, etc., {to de de kalos kai to kakos ergazesthai e epimeleisthai}, transl. 'between toil and carefulness well or ill expended there lies all the difference; the two things are sundered as wide apart as are the poles of work and play,' etc. A. Jacobs' emend. ap. Hartm. 'An. Xen.' p. 211, {to de de kakos ergazesthai e kakos epimeleisthai kei to kalos}, seems happy.
[27] Or, 'such a hoer aught but an idle loon.'
Such, Socrates, are the ills which cause a house to crumble far more than lack of scientific knowledge, however rude it be.[28] For if you will consider; on the one hand, there is a steady outflow[29] of expenses from the house, and, on the other, a lack of profitable works outside to meet expenses; need you longer wonder if the field-works create a deficit and not a surplus? In proof, however, that the man who can give the requisite heed, while straining every nerve in the pursuit of agriculture, has speedy[30] and effective means of making money, I may cite the instance of my father, who had practised what he preached.[31]
[28] Cf. Thuc. v. 7; Plat. 'Rep.' 350 A; 'Theaet.' 200 B.
[29] Or, 'the expenses from the house are going on at the full rate,' {enteleis}. Holden cf. Aristoph. 'Knights,' 1367: {ton misthon apodoso 'ntele}, 'I'll have the arrears of seamen's wages paid to a penny' (Frere).
[30] {anutikotaten}. Cf. 'Hipparch,' ii. 6.
[31] Or, 'who merely taught me what he had himself carried out in practice.'
Now, my father would never suffer me to purchase an estate already under cultivation, but if he chanced upon a plot of land which, owing to the neglect or incapacity of the owner, was neither tilled nor planted,[32] nothing would satisfy him but I must purchase it. He had a saying that estates already under cultivation cost a deal of money and allowed of no improvement; and where there is no prospect of improvement, more than half the pleasure to be got from the possession vanishes. The height of happiness was, he maintained, to see your purchase, be it dead chattel or live animal,[33] go on improving daily under your own eyes.[34] Now, nothing shows a larger increase[35] than a piece of land reclaimed from barren waste and bearing fruit a hundredfold. I can assure you, Socrates, many is the farm which my father and I made worth I do not know how many times more than its original value. And then, Socrates, this valuable invention[36] is so easy to learn that you who have but heard it know and understand it as well as I myself do, and can go away and teach it to another if you choose. Yet my father did not learn it of another, nor did he discover it by a painful mental process;[37] but, as he has often told me, through pure love of husbandry and fondness of toil, he would become enamoured of such a spot as I describe, [38] and then nothing would content him but he must own it, in order to have something to do, and at the same time, to derive pleasure along with profit from the purchase. For you must know, Socrates, of all Athenians I have ever heard of, my father, as it seems to me, had the greatest love for agricultural pursuits.
[32] i.e. out of cultivation, whether as corn land or for fruit trees, viz. olive, fig, vine, etc.
[33] Or, 'be it a dead thing or a live pet.' Cf. Plat. 'Theaet.' 174 B; 'Laws,' 789 B, 790 D, 819 B; 'C. I.' 1709.
[34] Cf. 'Horsem.' iii. 1; and see Cowley's Essay above referred to.
[35] Or, 'is susceptible of greater improvement.'
[36] Or, 'discovery.' See 'Anab.' III. v. 12; 'Hell.' IV. v. 4; 'Hunting,' xiii. 13.
[37] Or, 'nor did he rack his brains to discover it.' See 'Mem.' III. v. 23. Cf. Aristoph. 'Clouds,' 102, {merimnophrontistai}, minute philosophers.
[38] 'He could not see an estate of the sort described but he must fall over head and ears in love with it at first sight; have it he must.'
When I heard this, I could not resist asking a question; Ischomachus (I said), did your father retain possession of all the farms he put under cultivation, or did he part with them whenever he was offered a good price?
He parted with them, without a doubt (replied Ischomachus), but then at once he bought another in the place of what he sold, and in every case an untilled farm, in order to gratify his love for owrk.
As you describe him (I proceeded), your father must truly have been formed by nature with a passion for husbandry, not unlike that corn- hunger which merchants suffer from. You know their habits: by reason of this craving after corn,[39] whenever they hear that corn is to be got, they go sailing off to find it, even if they must cross the Aegean, or the Euxine, or the Sicilian seas. And when they have got as much as ever they can get, they will not let it out of their sight, but store it in the vessel on which they sail themselves, and off they go across the seas again.[40] Whenever they stand in need of money, they will not discharge their precious cargo,[41] at least not in haphazard fashion, wherever they may chance to be; but first they find out where corn is at the highest value, and where the inhabitants will set the greatest store by it, and there they take and deliver the dear article. Your father's fondness for agriculture seems to bear a certain family resemblance to this passion.
[39] Lit. 'of their excessive love for corn.'
[40] Lit. 'they carry it across the seas again, and that, too, after having stored it in the hold of the very vessel in which they sail themselves.'
[41] Or, 'their treasure.' {auton} throughout, which indeed is the humour of the passage. The love of John Barleycorn is their master passion.
To these remarks Ischomachus replied: You jest, Socrates; but still I hold to my belief: that man is fond of
