This will testify for me that I was not idle, and that I spared no pains to bring to pass whatever appeared necessary for my comfortable support, for I considered the keeping up a breed of tame creatures thus at my hand would be a living magazine of flesh, milk, butter, and cheese for me as long as I lived in the place, if it were to be forty years; and that keeping them in my reach depended entirely upon my perfecting my enclosures to such a degree that I might be sure of keeping them together; which by this method, indeed, I so effectually secured, that when these little stakes began to grow, I had planted them so very thick that I was forced to pull some of them up again.
Nè certo aveva torto nel riguardare nella razza d’animali domestici, così allevatami a mia disposizione, un vivaio perenne di carne, latte, burro e cacio, che non mi sarebbe più mancato per tutto il tempo del mio soggiorno in quel luogo, quand’anche avessi dovuto rimanerci altri quarant’anni. Così pure non mi ingannai nel credere che l’aver sempre questi animali al mio comando dipendeva affatto dal perfezionamento dello steccato, entro cui venivano custoditi e tenuti raccolti insieme.