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In that thick, green, fragrant growth around the house there is a

sure refuge for beasts and men. Often a hare, caught among the

cabbages, leaps to find surer hiding in the hemp than in the

shrubbery, for among the close-set stalks no greyhound can catch

it, nor foxhound smell it out because of the strong odour. In the

hemp a serving man, fleeing from the whip or the fist, sits

quietly until his master has spent his wrath. And often even

runaway peasant recruits, while the government is tracking them

in the woods, are sitting in the hemp. And hence at the time of

battles, forays, and confiscations, each side uses immense

exertions to occupy a position in the hemp, which commonly

extends forward to the walls of the mansion, and backward until

it joins the hop fields, and thus covers their attack and retreat

from the enemy.