The Peasantry.
Slavery, so prominent under the Roman rule, gradually disappeared during the middle ages. Yet the serf at first was but little better off, for, although he could not be sold, he could not leave the land. He did have some control of his person, for he had allotted to him a bit of land upon which he could work without being driven by an overseer. Later he was permitted to go out elsewhere for work, but for this he must possess a legal permit. This led to the custom of allowing him to pay his lord in money for his services in lieu of work upon the land or returns from the land, and then followed his being permitted to purchase his freedom, so that the serf could become a freedman.
During the early part of the period the laboring and the trading classes did not count as political, military, or social factors. They are scarcely mentioned in the records of the time. They were robbed by the nobles, their persons maltreated, and their wives and daughters dishonored. There were exactions of all kinds. They had to pay annual dues for the use of the land, they had to give a certain number of days free each year to the repair of the public roads and to the cultivation of the lord's domains, and they had to be ready, when called upon, to render military service of such an inferior kind as they could do. "He was bound to bake his bread at the lord's oven, grind his grain at the lord's mill, and press his grapes in his lord's wine-press, paying, of course, for the privilege; if he wanted to chase or cut wood in the forest, or fish in the stream, or feed his cattle in the pasture, all of which were reserved seigniorial rights, he must pay his tax. He must pay the lord for the use of his weights and measures, or for a guarantee against changes in his coinage. He may not even sell the remnant of crops which survived this accumulation of taxes until those of the lord have been sold at the highest market price. After the lord had squeezed the peasant almost to the point of extinction, came the church with its even more effectual agencies of terror and superstition. Its principal exaction was the tithe, a tax of one-tenth upon the products of agriculture, a burden sufficient, if rigidly enacted, to ruin any field industry. But not content with this, the church, like the feudal seignior, profited by every special occasion, birth, baptism, marriage, death, to collect new contributions."[202]
Even in the seventeenth century the life of the laboring man was very hard, as is shown in the following in reference to the British peasant of that time. "At the first setting out of the plough after Christmas, which was the time to begin fallowing, or breaking up the pease earth, the teams-man rose before 4 a. m., and after thanks to God for his night's rest, proceeded to the beast house. Here he foddered his cattle, cleaned out their booths, rubbed down the animals, currying the horses with cloths and wisps. Then he watered his oxen and horses. He next foddered the latter with chaff, dry pease, oat hulls, beans, or clean garbage, such as the hinder parts of rye. While they were eating their meal, he got ready his collars, hames, treats, halters, mullers, and plough gears. At 6 a. m. he received half an hour's liberty for breakfast. From seven till between two and three in the afternoon he ploughed. Then he unyoked, brought home his oxen, cleansed and foddered them, and, lastly, partook of his dinner, for which he was again granted another half hour's spell of leisure. By 4 p. m. he was again in the stable. After rubbing down his charges and re-cleansing their stalls, he went to the barns, where he prepared the fodder for the following day's bait. He carried this to the stable, and then watered his beasts and replenished their mangers. It was now close on 6 p. m. He therefore went home, got his supper, and then sat by the fireside, either mending his and the family's shoe-leather, or knocking hemp and flax, or picking and stamping apples and crabs for cider or vinegar, or grinding malt on the quern, or picking candle rushes, till 8 p. m. He then lighted his lanthorn and revisited the stable, where he again cleansed the stalls and planks, and replenished the racks with the night's fodder. Then, returning to his cottage, he gave God thanks for benefits received during the day, and went to bed."[203]