Note 573 — Chapter II
Reading edition
Sismondi, Républiques, xii, 38-41. The land was already cultivated on the métayer system, half the crop going to the tenant—a state of things advantageous all round. Villari (Two First Centuries, p. 315) pronounces that the Florentines looked sagaciously to trade, but harassed agriculture. This does not seem to be true of Italian polity in general.