"As to the number of shepherds, some make a narrow, some a broad, allowance. I have one shepherd for every eighty long wool sheep: Atticus here has one for every hundred. One can reduce the number of men required in respect of large flocks (like those containing a thousand head or more) much more readily than in respect of comparatively small flocks, like Atticus' and mine, for I have only seven hundred head of sheep, and you, Atticus, have, I believe, eight hundred, though we are alike in providing a ram for every ten ewes. Two men are required to care for a herd of fifty mares: and each of them should have a mare broken for riding to serve as a mount in those localities where it is the custom to drive the mares to pasture, as often happens in Apulia and Lucania." _Of milk and cheese and wool_ XI. "And now that we have fulfilled our promise, let us go," said Cossinius. "Not until you have added some thing," I cried, "concerning that supplemental profit from cattle which was promised; namely, of milk and cheese and the shearing of wool." So Cossinius resumed: "Ewes' milk, and, after it, goats' milk, is the most nourishing of all liquids which we drink. As a purgative, mares' milk ranks first, and, after it, in order, asses' milk, cows' milk and goats' milk, but the quality depends upon what has been fed to the cattle, upon the condition of the cattle, and upon when it is milked. "So far as concerns the food of the cattle, milk is nourishing which is made from barley and stover and other such kinds of dry and hard cattle food. "So far as concerns its purgative qualities, milk is good when made from green stuff, especially if it is grass containing plants which, taken by themselves, have a purgative effect upon the human body. "So far as concerns the condition of the cattle, that milk is best which comes from cattle in vigorous health and from those still young. "So far as concerns the time of milking, that milk is best which comes neither from a 'stripper' nor from a recently fresh dam. "The cheese made of cows' milk is the most agreeable to the taste but the most difficult to digest: next, that of ewes' milk, while the least agreeable in taste, but the most easily digested, is that of goats' milk. "There is also a distinction between cheese when it is soft and new made and when it is dry and old, for when it is soft it is more nourishing and digestible, but the opposite is true of old and dry cheese. "The custom is to make cheese from the rising of the Pleiades in spring to their rising in summer, and yet the rule is not invariable, because of difference in locality and the supply of forage.