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[59]
17. Xenophon's writings are very instructive
on many subjects and I beg you to go on reading
them with studious care. With what copious
eloquence agriculture is lauded in his book entitled
The Householder, which treats of the management
of estates! To show you that Xenophon regarded
nothing more befitting royalty than zeal in husbandry,
let me recall the incident1 in the same book, related
by Socrates in a conversation with Critobulus.
Cyrus the Younger, a Persian prince, eminent
for his intelligence and the glory of his rule, was
visited at Sardis by Lysander the Spartan, a man
of the highest virtue, who brought presents from the
allies Among other courtesies to Lysander while his
guest, Cyrus showed him a certain carefully planted
park. After admiring the stateliness of the trees,
regularly placed in quincunx rows,2 the clean and
well-cultivated soil, and the sweet odours emanating
from the flowers, Lysander then remarked: “I marvel
not only at the industry, but also at the skill of the
man who planned and arranged this work.” “But
it was I,” Cyrus answered, “who planned it all;
mine are the rows and mine the arrangement, and
many of those trees I set out with my own hands.”
[p. 73]
After gazing at the prince's purple robe, the beauty
of his person, his Persian costume adorned with
much gold and many precious stones, Lysander said:
“With good reason, Cyrus, men call you happy,
since in you good fortune has been joined with
virtue.”
Cicero: De Senectute De Amicitia De Divinatione. With An English Translation. William Armistead Falconer. Cambridge. Harvard University Press; Cambridge, Mass., London, England. 1923.
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