Among the farms of freemen and vassals might be found the farm of a larger landed proprietor, who had a manor house with a hall, and a great number of huts for domestics and labourers. For as yet, artisans, wheelwrights, potters, armourers, and goldsmiths were most of them bondmen; as the number of markets and cities were small, their influence in the country was still unimportant. All kinds of grain were cultivated in the fields, which are now used in our succession of crops, and in the gardens, almost all the vegetables of our markets, also gherkins, pumpkins, and melons; the laws were vigilant for the protection of the orchards. The clergy brought from Italy costly grafts, and peaches and apricots were to be found in the gardens of the wealthy. Already the old Bavarian house began to appear, formed of beams, with galleries outside, and its flat projecting roof; and it may be assumed also, that the old Saxon house with its heathen horses' heads on the gable ends, its thatched roof over the porch, its hearth, sleeping cells, and cattle stalls, spread widely over the country, and that the Thuringians, even then, as in a century later, lived in the unfloored hall, in the background of which a raised dais--the most distinguished part of the house--separated from the hall the women's apartments and the sleeping-rooms. Dwellings were seldom without a bathhouse; for their winter work the women descended into their underground chamber, which had already astonished the Romans, where stood the loom; the places for the mistresses and servants were separated. In the court-yard fluttered numerous poultry, amongst them swans and even cranes, which, up to the Thirty Years' War, were treasured as masters of the German poultry yard. The greatest pleasure of the countryman was the training of his horse, and the steeds which were used in war were of great value. They pastured with their feet hobbled; any one was severely punished who stole them from their pasture; the impositions of horse dealers also were well known, and the laws endeavoured to afford protection against them. All the South Germans fastened bells round the necks of their cattle, and the Franconians round the swine in the woods.