Diodorus: "When the Tyrrhenians had the Corsican cities in their possession, they demanded from the natives tribute of resin, wax, and honey, which are here produced in abundance. The Corsican slaves are of great excellence, and seem to be preferable to other slaves for the common purposes of life. The whole broad island is for the most part mountainous, rich in shady woods, watered by little rivers. The inhabitants live on milk, honey, and flesh, all which they have in plenty. The Corsicans are just towards each other, and live in a more civilized manner than all other barbarians. For when honey-combs are found in the woods, they belong without dispute to the first finder. The sheep, being distinguished by certain marks, remain safe, even although their master does not guard them. Also in the regulation of the rest of their life, each one in his place observes the laws of rectitude with wonderful faithfulness. They have a custom at the birth of a child which is most strange and new; for no care is taken of a woman in child-birth; but instead of her, the husband lays himself for some days as if sick and worn out in bed. Much boxwood grows there, and that of no mean sort. From this arises the great bitterness of the honey. The island is inhabited by barbarians, whose speech is strange and hard to be understood. The number of the inhabitants is more than thirty thousand." Seneca: "For, leaving out of account such places as by the pleasantness of the region, and their advantageous situation, allure great numbers, go to remote spots on rude islands--go to Sciathus, and Seriphus, and Gyarus, and Corsica, and you will find no place of banishment where some one or other does not reside for his own pleasure. Where shall we find anything so naked, so steep and rugged on every side, as this rocky island? Where is there a land in respect of its products scantier, in respect of its people more inhospitable, in respect of its situation more desolate, or in respect of its climate more unhealthy? And yet there live here more foreigners than natives." According to the accounts of the oldest writers, we must doubtless believe that Corsica was in those times to a very great extent uncultivated, and, except in the matter of wood, poor in natural productions. That Seneca exaggerates is manifest, and is to be explained from the situation in which he wrote. Strabo and Diodorus are of opposite opinions as to the character of the Corsican slaves. The former has in his favour the history and unvarying character of the Corsicans, who have ever shown themselves in the highest degree incapable of slavery, and Strabo could have pronounced on them no fairer eulogy than in speaking of them as he has done. What Diodorus, who writes as if more largely informed, says of the Corsican sense of justice, is entirely true, and is confirmed by the experience of every age.