BODO AT HIS WORK [Illustration: II.

EMBARKATION OF THE POLOS AT VENICE] Beside the seigniorial manse, there were a number of little dependent manses.

These belonged to men and women who were in various stages of freedom, except for the fact that all had to do work on the land of the chief manse.

There is no need to trouble with the different classes, for in practice there was very little difference between them, and in a couple of centuries they were all merged into one common class of medieval villeins.

The most important people were those called _coloni_, who were personally free (that is to say, counted as free men by the law), but bound to the soil, so that they could never leave their farms and were sold with the estate, if it were sold.