isdom might survive for the benefit of the
"uttermost generations of men" chiefly in the case of this treatise
on Husbandry among the many monuments of his industry and learning.
Petrarch in his _Epistle to Varro_ in that first delightful book of
Letters to Dead Authors (_de rebus familiaribus_ XXIV, 6) rehearses
the loss of Varro's books and, adapting the thought here expressed in
the text, regrets for that reason that Varro cannot be included in
that company of men "whom we love even after their death owing to
the good and righteous deeds that live after them, men who mold our
character by their teaching and comfort us by their example, when
the rest of mankind offends both our eyes and our nostrils; men who,
though they have gone hence to the common abode of all (as Plautus
says in Casina), nevertheless continue to be of service to the
living." If Petrarch had been a farmer he might have saved some of his
regret, for Varro is surely, by virtue of the _Rerum Rusticarum_, a
member of the fellowship Petrarch describes.]

[Footnote 43: Varro was essentially an antiquary and it is amusing
to observe that he is unable to suppress his learning even in his
prayers. One is reminded of the anecdote of the New England minister,
who, in the course of an unctuous prayer, proclaimed, with magisterial
authority, "Paradoxical as it may appear, O Lord, it is nevertheless
true, etc."]

[Footnote 44: Following Plato and Xenophon and Cicero, Varro cast his
books into the form of dialogues to make them entertaining ("and what
is the use of a book," thought Alice in Wonderland, "without pictures
or conversations."): for the same reason he was careful about his
local colour. Thus the scene of this first book, which relates to
agriculture proper, is laid at Rome in the temple of Earth on the
festival of the Seed Sowing, and the characters bear names of punning
reference to the tilling of the soil. Varro was strong on puns,
avowing (Cicero _Acad_. I, 2) that that form of humour made it easier
for people of small intelligence to swallow his learning.]

[Footnote 45: The story is that when Scipio captured Carthage he
distributed the Punic libraries among the native allies, reserving
only the agricultural works of Mago, which the Roman Senate
subsequently ordered to be translated into Latin, so highly were they
esteemed. Probably more real wealth was brought to Rome in the pages
of these precious volumes than was represented by all the other