aggy at the knees in spite of the most skilful cutting; and
the party-coloured hose, having one leg of one piece of stuff and one of
another, and sometimes each leg of two or more colours, were very likely
first invented from motives of economy, to use up cuttings and leavings.
Clothes were looked upon as permanent and very desirable property, and
kings did not despise a gift of fine scarlet cloth, in the piece, to
make them a gown or a cloak. As for linen, as late as the sixteenth
century, the English thought the French nobles very extravagant because
they put on a clean shirt once a fortnight and changed their ruffles
once a week.

[Illustration: PALAZZO DI VENEZIA]

The mediaeval Roman nobles were most of them great farmers as well as
fighters. Then, as now, land was the ultimate form of property, and its
produce the usual form of wealth; and then, as now, many families were
'land-poor,' in the sense of owning tracts of country which yielded
little or no income but represented considerable power, and furnished
the owners with most of the necessaries of life, such rents as were
collected being usually paid in kind, in oil and wine, in grain, fruit
and vegetables, and even in salt meat, and horses, cattle for
slaughtering and beasts of burden, not to speak of wool, hemp and flax,
as well as firewood. But money was scarce and, consequently, all the
things which only money could buy, so that a gown was a possession, and
a corselet or a good sword a treasure. The small farmer of our times
knows what it means to have plenty to eat and little to wear. His
position is not essentially different from that of the average landed
gentry in the Middle Age, not only in Italy, but all over Europe. In
times when superiority lay in physical strength, courage, horsemanship
and skill in the use of arms, the so-called gentleman was not
distinguished from the plebeian by the newness or neatness of his
clothes so much as by the nature and quality of the weapons he wore when
he went abroad in peace or war, and very generally by being mounted on a
good horse.

In his home he was simple, even primitive. He desired space more than
comfort, and comfort more than luxury. His furniture consisted almost
entirely of beds, chests and benches, with few tables except such as
were needed for eating. Beds were supported by boards laid on trestles,
raised very high above the floor to be beyond the reach of rats, mice
and other creatures. The lower mat