The fact that there were three daughters-in-law and only two sons was the result of the Conscription, which had taken away the youngest son shortly after his marriage.

The two who remained spent only a small part of the year at home.

The one was a carpenter and the other a bricklayer, and both wandered about the country in search of employment, as their father had done in his younger days.

There was, however, one difference.

The father had always shown a leaning towards commercial transactions, rather than the simple practice of his handicraft, and consequently he had usually lived and travelled alone.
The sons, on the contrary, confined themselves to their handicrafts, and were always during the working season members of an artel.
The artel in its various forms is a curious institution.