“Certainly,” agreed Merula, “for I have seen there great flocks of geese, chickens, pigeons, cranes and pea-cocks:  also dormice, fish, wild boars and other such game.[162] The freedman who keeps his books which Varro has seen, assured me when he was doing the honours in the absence of his master, that Seius derives an income of more than fifty thousand sesterces ($2,500) per annum from his villa.”

As Axius seemed astonished, I asked him:  “Surely you know the estate of my aunt in the Sabine country which is at the twenty-fourth mile stone from Rome on the via Salaria.”

“Of course, I do,” Axius replied, “for it is there that I am wont to divide the day in summer on my way from Reate to town and to spend the night when I come thence in winter.”

“Well,” I continued, “in that villa there is an aviary from which I know that there were taken in one season five thousand thrushes, which, at three deniers apiece, means that that department of the establishment brought in a revenue of sixty thousand sesterces that year, or twice the yield of the entire two hundred jugera of your farm at Reate."[163]

“What, sixty thousand,” exclaimed Axius, “sixty thousand:  you are making game of me!”

“Sixty thousand,” I affirmed, “but in order that you might realize such a lucky throw you will require either a public banquet or a triumph on the scale of that of Scipio Metellus, or club dinners, which indeed have now become so frequent as to raise the price of provisions of the market.”

“You will perchance expect this return every year,” said Merula, “so I trust that your aviary may not lead you into a loss.  But surely in such good times as these it could not happen that you would fail, except rarely, for what year is there that does not see such a feast or a triumph, or club dinners, such as now-a-days consume victuals without number.  Nay,” he added, “it seems that in our habit of luxury such a public banquet is a daily occurrence within the gates of Rome."[164]

To supplement the examples of such profits:  L. Albutius, a learned man and, as you know, the author of certain satires in the manner of Lucilius, has said that the returns from feeding live stock on his Alban farm are always less than his income from his villa, for the farm yields less than ten thousand sesterces and the villa more than twenty.  He even maintains that if he should establish a villa near the sea in such a place as he might choose he could derive from it an income of more than a hundred thousand sesterces.  Did not M. Cato recently sell forty thousand sesterces worth of fishes from the fish ponds of Lucullus after he had accepted the administration of his estate?”

“My dear Merula,” exclaimed Axius, “take me, I beg of you, as your pupil in the art of the husbandry of the steading.”

“I will begin,” replied Merula, “as soon as you promise me a minerval in the form of a dinner."[165]