would certainly have shuddered to hear of any of her nations asking for candles.

"Candles indeed!" she would have said; "who ever heard of such a thing?
and with so much excellent daylight running to waste, as I have provided _gratis_! What will the wretches want next ?"'[4] Something of the same situation prevailed even in Bodo's time.
This, then, is how Bodo and Ermentrude usually passed their working day.
But, it may be complained, this is all very well.

We know about the estates on which these peasants lived and about the rents which they had to pay, and the services which they had to do.

But how did they feel and think and amuse themselves when they were not working?
Rents and services are only outside things; an estate book only describes routine.
It would be idle to try to picture the life of a university from a study of its lecture list, and it is equally idle to try and describe the life of Bodo from the estate book of his masters.

It is no good taking your meals in the kitchen if you never talk to the servants.