“But why should we,” exclaimed Vaccius, “for it is related that on several occasions at Rome a mule has had a foal.”

To back up what Vaccius had said, I cited Mago and Dionysius as writing that when mules and mares conceive they bear in the twelfth month.  “If,” I added, “it is considered a prodigy in Italy when a mule has a foal, it is not necessarily so in all countries.  For is it not true that swallows and swans breed in Italy, which do not lay in other lands, and don’t you know that the Syrian date palm, which bears fruit in Judea, does not yield in Italy?”

“If you prefer,” said Scrofa, “to make out the entire eighty-one chapters without any on the care of mules during the breeding season, there are subjects with which you can fill this double vacancy by adding those two kinds of extraordinary profit which is derived from live stock.  One of these is the fleece which men shear or pull from sheep and goats, the other, which is more widely practised, that from milk and cheese:  the Greek writers indeed actually treat this separately under the title [Greek:  turopoiia], and have written extensively about it.”

Of sheep

II.  “And now, since I have completed my task and the economy of live stock husbandry has been defined, do you, men of Epirus, requite us by expounding the subject in detail, so that we may see of what the shepherds of Pergamis and Maledos are capable.”

At this challenge, Atticus (who then was known as T. Pomponius but now as Q. Caecilius retaining the same cognomen)[117] began as follows: 

“I gather that I must make the beginning since you seem to turn your eyes upon me:  so I will speak of those cattle which you, Varro, have called primitive, for you say that sheep were the first of the wild beasts of the field which were captured and domesticated by man.

“In the first place you should buy good sheep, and they are so judged primarily in respect of their age, that they are not what is known as aged nor yet undeveloped lambs, because neither can yield you any profit, the one no longer, the other not yet:  but you may deem that age which holds out a promise preferable to that whose only future is death.  So far as concerns conformation, a sheep should have a round barrel, wool thick and soft and with long fibre, and, while heavy all over the body, it should be thickest on the back and neck, and yet the belly also should be covered, for unless the belly was covered our ancestors were wont to call a sheep apica and throw it out.  They should have short legs,[118] and, if they are of the Italian breed, long tails, or short tails if they come from Syria.  The most important point to guard is that your flock is headed by a good sire.  The quality of a ram can usually be determined from his conformation and from his get.  So far as concerns conformation, a ram should have a face well covered with wool, horns twisted and converging on the muzzle, tawny eyes, woolly ears, a deep chest,