The sad plight of the poorer laboring classes was largely due to the terrible institution of slavery which prevailed everywhere in ancient times. So soon as the Romans had begun to conquer distant provinces the number of slaves greatly increased. For six or seven centuries before the barbarian invasions every kind of labor fell largely into their hands in both country and town. There were millions of them. A single rich landholder might own hundreds and even thousands, and it was a poor man that did not have several at least. [Sidenote: The villa.] Land was the only highly esteemed form of wealth in the Roman Empire, in spite of the heavy taxes imposed upon it. Without large holdings of land no one could hope to enjoy a high social position or an honorable office under the government. Consequently the land came gradually into the hands of the rich and ambitious, and the small landed proprietor disappeared. Great estates called _villas_ covered Italy, Gaul, and Britain. These were cultivated and managed by armies of slaves, who not only tilled the land, but supplied their master, his household, and themselves with all that was needed on the plantation. The artisans among them made the tools, garments, and other manufactured articles necessary for the whole community, or "family," as it was called. Slaves cooked the food, waited on the proprietor, wrote his letters, and read to him. To a head slave the whole management of the villa was intrusted. A villa might be as extensive as a large village, but all its members were under the absolute control of the proprietor of the estate. A well-organized villa could supply itself with everything that it needed, and found little or no reason for buying from any outsider. [Sidenote: Slavery brings labor into disrepute.] Quite naturally, freemen came to scorn all manual labor and even trade, for these occupations were associated in their minds with the despised slave. Seneca, the philosopher, angrily rejects the suggestion that the practical arts were invented by a philosopher; they were, he declares, "thought out by the meanest bondman." [Sidenote: Competition of slaves fatal to the freeman.] Slavery did more than bring manual labor into disrepute; it largely monopolized the market. Each great household where articles of luxury were in demand relied upon its own host of dexterous and efficient slaves to produce them. Moreover, the owners of slaves frequently hired them out to those who needed workmen, or permitted them to work for wages, and in this way brought them into a competition with the free workman which was fatal to him. [Sidenote: Improved condition of the slaves and their emancipation.]