serf, his
relation to his lord differing only in degree, though in material
degree, from that of the chattel slave. He might be, and often was, as
brutally ill-treated as the slave before him had been; he might be
ill-fed and ill-housed; his wife or daughters might be ravished by his
master or his master's sons. Yet, withal, his condition was better than
that of the slave. He could maintain his family life in an independent
household; he possessed some rights, chief of which perhaps was the
right to labor for himself. Having his own allotment of land, he was in
a much larger sense a human being. Compelled to render so many days'
service to his lord, tilling the soil, clearing the forest, quarrying
stone, and doing domestic work, he was permitted to devote a certain,
often an equal, number of days to work for his own benefit. Not only so,
but the service the lord rendered him, in protecting him and his family
from the lawless and violent robber hordes which infested the country,
was considerable.

The feudal estate, or manor, was an industrial whole, self-dependent,
and having few essential ties binding it to the outside world. The
barons and their retainers, lords, thanes, and freemen, enjoyed a
certain rude plenty, some of the richer barons enjoying a considerable
amount of luxury and splendor. The _villein_ and his sons tilled the
soil, reaped the harvests, felled trees for fuel, built the houses,
raised the necessary domestic animals, and killed the wild animals; his
wife and daughters spun the flax, carded the wool, made the homespun
clothing, brewed the mead, and gathered the grapes which they made into
wine. There was little real dependence upon the outside world except
for articles of luxury.

Such was the basic economic institution of feudalism. But alongside of
the feudal estate with its serf labor, there were the free laborers, no
longer regarding labor as shameful and degrading. These free laborers
were the handicraftsmen and free peasants, the former soon organizing
themselves into guilds. There was a specialization of labor, but, as
yet, little division. Each man worked at a particular craft and
exchanged his individual products. The free craftsman would exchange his
product with the free peasant, and sometimes his trade extended to the
feudal manor. The guild was at once his master and protector; rigid in
its rules, strict in its surveillance of its members, it was strong and
effective as a protector aga