“What is to be said about mules,"[142] replied Murrius, “may be said briefly.  Mules and hinnies are mongrels and grafts as it were on a stock of a different species, for a mule is got by an ass out of a mare, and a hinny by a horse out of a she ass.  Both have their uses, but neither is fit to reproduce its kind.  For this purpose it is the custom to put a newborn ass colt to nurse to a mare because mares’ milk will make it more vigorous:  it is considered better than asses’ milk, or indeed than any other kind of milk.  Later they are fed on straw, hay and barley.  The foster mother must be given good attention also, as she must bring up her own colt in addition to her service as a wet nurse.  An ass raised in this way is fit to get mules when he is three years old, nor will he contemn the mares because he has become used to their kind.  If you use him for breeding earlier he will quickly exhaust himself and his get will be poor.

“If you have no ass foal to have brought up by a mare and you wish a breeding jackass, you should buy the largest and handsomest you can find; the best breed, as the ancients said, was that of Arcadia, but nowadays we who know maintain that the breed of Reate is best:  where breeding jacks have brought thirty and even forty thousand sesterces ($1,800-$2,000).

“Jacks are bought like horses, with the same stipulations and guarantees.  We feed them principally on hay and barley, increasing the ration at the breeding season so as to infuse strength into their get by means of their food.  The breeding season is the same as for horses, and, like them again, we have the jack handled by a studgroom.

“When a mare has dropped a mule colt or filly we bring it up with care.  Those which are born in marshy and swampy country have soft hoofs, but if they are driven up into the mountain in summer, as we do at Reate, their hoofs become hardened.

“In buying mules you must consider age and conformation, the one that they may be able to work under a load, the other that the eye may have pleasure in looking at them:  for a team of two good mules is capable of drawing any kind of a wagon on the road.

“You, my friend from Reate,” Murrius added, turning to me, “can vouch for what I have said, as you yourself have herds of breeding mares at home and have bred and sold many mules.

“The get of a horse out of a she ass is called a hinny:  he is smaller in the body and usually redder in colour than a mule, and has ears like a horse, but mane and tail like an ass.  Hinnies are carried by the dam twelve months, like a horse, and, like the horse too, they are raised and fed, and their age can be told by their teeth.”

Of herd dogs