t 1143
(proportion to-jugerum-)
Vines and stakes 2000
Loss of interest during the first two years 497
----
Total 4640 sesterces= 47 pounds.

He calculates the produce as at any rate 60 -amphorae-, worth at least
900 sesterces (9 pounds), which would thus represent a return of 17
per cent. But this is somewhat illusory, as, apart from bad harvests,
the cost of gathering in the produce (III. XII. Spirit of the System),
and the expenses of the maintenance of the vines, stakes, and slaves,
are omitted from the estimate.

The gross produce of meadow, pasture, and forest is estimated by the
same agricultural writer as, at most, 100 sesterces per -jugerum-, and
that of corn land as less rather than more: in fact, the average
return of 25 -modii- of wheat per -jugerum- gives, according to the
average price in the capital of 1 -denarius- per -modius-, not more
than 100 sesterces for the gross proceeds, and at the seat of
production the price must have been still lower. Varro (iii. 2)
reckons as a good ordinary gross return for a larger estate 150
sesterces per -jugerum-. Estimates of the corresponding expense have
not reached us: as a matter of course, the management in this instance
cost much less than in that of a vineyard.

All these statements, moreover, date from a century or more after
Gate's death. From him we have only the general statement that the
breeding of cattle yielded a better return than agriculture (ap.
Cicero, De Off. ii. 25, 89; Colum. vi. praef. 4, comp. ii. 16, 2;
Plin. H. N. xviii. 5, 30; Plutarch, Cato, 21); which of course is not
meant to imply that it was everywhere advisable to convert arable land
into pasture, but is to be understood relatively as signifying that
the capital invested in the rearing of flocks and herds on mountain
pastures and other suitable pasture-land yielded, as compared with
capital invested in cultivating Suitable corn land, a higher interest.
Perhaps the circumstance has been also taken into account in the
calculation, that the want of energy and intelligence in the landlord
operates far less injuriously in the case of pasture-land than in the
highly-developed culture of the vine and olive. On an arable estate,
according to Cato, the returns of the soil stood as follows in a
descending series:--1, vineyard; 2, vegetable garden; 3, osier copse,
which