are vigorous and lively; and though they are but of a middle stature, and
have neither the fruitfullest soil nor the purest air in the world; yet
they fortify themselves so well, by their temperate course of life,
against the unhealthiness of their air, and by their industry they so
cultivate their soil, that there is nowhere to be seen a greater
increase, both of corn and cattle, nor are there anywhere healthier men
and freer from diseases; for one may there see reduced to practice not
only all the art that the husbandman employs in manuring and improving an
ill soil, but whole woods plucked up by the roots, and in other places
new ones planted, where there were none before. Their principal motive
for this is the convenience of carriage, that their timber may be either
near their towns or growing on the banks of the sea, or of some rivers,
so as to be floated to them; for it is a harder work to carry wood at any
distance over land than corn. The people are industrious, apt to learn,
as well as cheerful and pleasant, and none can endure more labour when it
is necessary; but, except in that case, they love their ease. They are
unwearied pursuers of knowledge; for when we had given them some hints of
the learning and discipline of the Greeks, concerning whom we only
instructed them (for we know that there was nothing among the Romans,
except their historians and their poets, that they would value much), it
was strange to see how eagerly they were set on learning that language:
we began to read a little of it to them, rather in compliance with their
importunity than out of any hopes of their reaping from it any great
advantage: but, after a very short trial, we found they made such
progress, that we saw our labour was like to be more successful than we
could have expected: they learned to write their characters and to
pronounce their language so exactly, had so quick an apprehension, they
remembered it so faithfully, and became so ready and correct in the use
of it, that it would have looked like a miracle if the greater part of
those whom we taught had not been men both of extraordinary capacity and