Turning in the saddle to his companion, Decius Gorgo gestured to the scene below and said, "We rustics welcome you back to Experimentum, Tribune."

Grinning, the other figure brought his right hand up to touch the brim of his floppy petasus in mock salute. Tiberius Gallus heaved an audible sigh of contentment as he surveyed the progress made thus far in the farming hamlet of Experimentium. "Let us say hello to these sturdy men of the earth!" Kicking his mount, he trotted down the hill, followed by his engineer.

Later, comfortably ensconed under a pavilion, its four sides open to the afternoon breezes, Gallus received his clients. He listened to their stories of struggle and triumph, nodded appreciatively at the baskets of produce brought to him by proud new farmers. These men, once part of the urban rabble ready to come to blows with each other over the occasional loaf of free bread distributed by an aedile bent on gaining influence, were now themselves producers of that bread!

Gallus remained there under the pavilion as the twilight turned to evening, just looking, smelling, and listening. Tomorrow he would return to this pavilion just after breakfast, this time armed with a sturdy farmhouse table and a stack of blank wax tablets. He had much work to do: the lex against juror corruption, a bill on refining the chain of command for propraetors and commanders in the field, planning for the Tribunes' Festival, and of course the capstone work of his tenure as Tribune, the Senatus Consultum Gallo Agri Pro Populus.

He could think of no better venue in all the whole, wide Roman world to begin writing than this exact spot!