[Sidenote: =The serfs=]
Below the lords, who spent their time in war, in the chase, and in
going to see play-battles, called mock-fights, were the common people.
In some countries these people were not free, as you are, but lived in
huts in small villages on the great man's land. They had to work on his
land, and were only a little better off than slaves. These people were
called serfs.
In the few large cities there lived at that time rich merchants who
traded in slaves, or went on long journeys to buy and sell their wares.
In the cities, too, lived workers in wool, cotton, brass, iron, wood,
and other materials. After a time the workers of a given class gathered
into a sort of union called a guild, to protect themselves.
[Sidenote: =The roots of our civilization=]
But in neither country nor city did the common man have the many rights
and privileges he has now-a-days in America.
These people, so different from us, got their habits and their ways of
doing things from still older nations in Asia, in Africa and in Europe.