Latin Texts & Translations

The first person who formed artificial oyster-beds was Ser-

gius Orata, ^[Note] who established them at Baiæ, in the time of L. Crassus, the orator, just before the Marsic War. This was done by him, not for the gratification of gluttony, but of avarice, as he contrived to make a large income by this exercise of his ingenuity. He was the first, too, to invent hanging baths, ^[Note] and after buying villas and trimming them up, he would every now and then sell them again. ^[Note] He, too, was the first to adjudge the pre-eminence for delicacy of flavour to the oysters of Lake Lucrinus; ^[Note] for every kind of aquatic animal is superior in one place to what it is in another. Thus, for instance, the wolf-fish of the river Tiber is the best that is caught between the two bridges, ^[Note] and the turbot of Ravenna is the most esteemed, the murena of Sicily, the elops of Rhodes; the same, too, as to the other kinds, not to go through all the items of the culinary catalogue. The British ^[Note] shores had not as yet sent their supplies, at the time when Orata thus ennobled the Lucrine oysters: at a later period, however, it was thought worth while to fetch oysters all the way from Brundisium, at the very extremity of Italy; and in order that there might exist no rivalry ^[Note] between the two flavours, a plan has been

more recently hit upon, of feeding the oysters of Brundisium in Lake Lucrinus, famished as they must naturally be after so long a journey.