you, and you will not be able to leave the house without
breaking that cross. Answer: Stand before a post in your house,
with your arms extended. 2. What you do not know, and I do not
know, and no one can know after I have told you. Answer: I will
take a straw from the floor of the room, measure its inches, tell
you the length, and break the straw. 3. A pear tree bears all the
fruit a pear tree can bear and did not bear pears. Answer: It bore
only one pear.

The dress of the higher classes was very changeable and subject to
fashion as well as function. Ladies no longer braided their hair
in long tails, but rolled it up in a net under a veil, often
topped with an elaborate and fanciful headdress. They wore non-
functional long trains on their tunics and dainty shoes. Men wore
a long gown, sometimes clasped around the waist. Overtunics were
often lined or trimmed with native fur such as squirrel. People
often wore solid red, blue, or green clothes. Only monks and
friars wore brown. The introduction of buttons and buttonholes to
replace pins and laces made clothing warmer, and it could be made
tighter. After Edward I established the standard inch as three
continuous dried barleycorns, shoes came in standard sizes and
with a right one different from a left one. The spinning wheel
came into existence to replace the handheld spindle. Now one hand
could be used to form the thread while the other hand turned a
large upright wheel that caused the thread to wind around the
spindle, which did not have to be held by hand. This resulted in
an uninterrupted spinning motion which was not interrupted by
alternately forming the thread and winding it on the spindle.

Lords surrounded themselves with people of the next lower rank,
usually from nearby families, and had large households. For
instance, the king had a circle of noblemen and ladies about him.
A peer or great prelate had a household of about 100-200 people,
among which were his inner circle, companions, administrators,
secretaries, bodyguards and armed escort, chaplain, singing
priests and choirboys, and servants. All officers of the household
were gentlemen. The secretary was usually a clerk, who was
literate because he had taken minor clerical orders. Since the
feudal obligation of the tenants was disappearing, a lord
sometimes hired retainers to supplement his escort of fighting
men. They proudly wore his livery of cloth or hat, which was in
the nature of a uniform or ba