The planting of gardens and orchards was encouraged, and a man was allowed to use a field for this purpose without paying a yearly rent. He might plant it and tend it for four years, and in the fifth year of his tenancy the original owner of the field took half of the garden in payment, while the other half the planter of the garden kept for himself. If a bare patch had been left in the garden it was to be reckoned in the planter’s half. Regulations were framed to ensure the proper carrying out of the planting, for if the tenant neglected to do this during the first four years, he was still liable to plant the plot he had taken without receiving his half, and he had to pay the owner compensation in addition, which varied in amount according to the original condition of the land. If a man hired a garden, the rent he paid to the owner was fixed at two-thirds of its produce. Detailed regulations are also given in the code concerning the hire of cattle and asses, and the compensation to be paid to the owner for the loss or ill-treatment of his beasts. These are framed on the just principle that the hirer was responsible only for damage or loss which he could have reasonably prevented. Thus, if a lion killed a hired ox or ass in the open country, or if an ox was killed by lightning, the loss fell upon the owner and not on the man who hired the beast. But if the hirer killed the ox through carelessness or by beating it unmercifully, or if the beast broke its leg while in his charge, he had to restore another ox to the owner in place of the one he had hired. For lesser damages to the beast the hirer had to pay compensation on a fixed scale. Thus, if the ox had its eye knocked out during the period of its hire, the man who hired it had to pay to the owner half its value; while for a broken horn, the loss of the tail, or a torn muzzle, he paid a quarter of the value of the beast.