The object which engrossed my attention the most, however, was what seems
to have been a circular issued prior to the great volcanic vomit of 79
A.D., and no doubt prior even to the Christian era. As the date is torn
off however, we are left to conjecture the time at which it was issued. I
was permitted to make a copy of it, and with the aid of my hired man, I
have translated it with great care.
Office of Lucretius & Procalus,
Dealers In
Flour, Bran, Shorts, Middlings, Screenings, Etruscan Hen Feed, and Other
Choice Bric-A-Brac.
_Highest Cash Price Paid for Neapolitan Winter Wheat and Roman Corn
Why haul your Wheat through the sand to Herculaneum when we pay the same
price here?_
Office and Mill, Via VIII, Near the Stabian Gate, Only Thirteen Blocks
From the P.O., Pompeii.
Dear Sir: This circular has been called out by another one issued last
month by Messrs. Toecorneous & Chilblainicus, alleged millers and wheat
buyers of Herculaneum, in which they claim to pay a quarter to a half-cent
more per bushel than we do for wheat, and charge us with docking the
farmers around Pompeii a pound per bushel more than necessary for cockle,
wild buck-wheat, and pigeon-grass seed. They make the broad statement that
we have made all our money in that way, and claim that Mr. Lucretius, of
our mill, has erected a fine house, which the farmers allude to as the
“wild buckwheat villa.”
[Illustration: TWO OLD ROMANS.]
We do not, as a general rule, pay any attention to this kind of stuff; but
when two snide romans, who went to Herculaneum without a dollar and drank
stale beer out of an old Etruscan tomato-can the first year they were
there, assail our integrity, we feel justified in making a prompt and
final reply. We desire to state to the Roman farmers that we do not test
their wheat with the crooked brass tester that has made more money for
Messrs. Toecorneous & Chilblainicus than their old mill has. We do not do
that kind of business. Neither do we buy a man's wheat at a cash price and
then work off four or five hundred pounds of XXXX Imperial hog feed on him
in part payment. When we buy a man's wheat we pay him in money. We do not
seek to fill him up with sour Carthagenian cracked wheat and orders on the
store.
We would also call attention to the improvements that we have just made in
our mill. Last week we put a handle in the upper burr, and we have also
engaged one of the best head millers in Pompeii to turn the crank
day-times. Our old head miller will oversee the business at night, so that
the mill will be in full blast night and day, except when the head miller
has gone to his meals or stopped to spit on his hands.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account