Of such a type we may imagine Rhea Sylvia, the legendary mother of Romulus and Remus. She was the daughter of a king, but one who was not a monarch in the later significance of the title. Of kings there were many in the Latium of those days. The title meant merely the patriarch of a clan, or the head man of a small city. The regal abode was probably a small, round structure, built of wood and roofed with straw. It may have consisted of only one room, with a hole in the ceiling to admit light and allow the smoke to escape. Of furniture there was little more than rude tables and grass or leaf covered couches, together with the Lares, or household gods. But though life conditioned by such meagre accessories was simple, it was by no means idle, and there existed no such contempt for labor and handicraft among the Latin tribesmen as grew up in later times. The king himself followed the plow, while his wife and daughters were busy with the distaff and spindle, the hand loom and the needle. It was the duty of the women to spin the wool and to make all the clothing for the household. Education consisted solely of the training in the requirements of this simple life, and was provided by no school other than the daily experience which the boys and girls gathered among their elders. The art of writing was in the earliest days not entirely unknown, though, during long years of slow development, it was employed only in painting public records on leaves and skins; or, if greater permanence was required, the records were scratched upon tablets of wood. The amusements of the people consisted mainly of the festivals and athletic games which were held in honor of the gods. If it might only be believed that this life was as pleasant as it is pictured by Virgil, it would be easy to sympathize with the poet when he declares that he pined for such an existence himself. "The husbandman cleaves the earth with the crooked plow.... Winter comes: the Sicyonian berry is pounded in the oil presses; and the autumn lays down its various productions.... Meanwhile, the sweet babes twine around their parents' necks; his chaste family maintain their purity. The swain himself celebrates festal days; and extended on the grass, where a fire is in the middle, and where his companions crown the bowl, invokes thee, O Lanæus, making libation. On an elm is set forth to the masters of the flock prizes to be contended for with the winged javelin; and they strip their rustic bodies for the friendly struggle." Elsewhere the poet describes a home scene, where the man is working by the light of the winter fire: "Meanwhile, his spouse, cheering by song her tedious labor, runs over the webs with the shrill shuttle; or over the fire boils down the liquor of the luscious must, and skims with leaves the tide of the trembling cauldron. This life of old the ancient Sabines followed; this, Remus and his brother strictly observed; thus Etruria grew in strength;