§271. Manufacture.--In the old days the wool was spun at home by the maidservants working under the eye of the mistress (§199), and woven into cloth on the family loom, and this was kept up throughout the Republic by some of the proudest families. Augustus wore these home-made garments. By the end of the Republic, however, this was no longer general, and while much of the native wool was worked up on the farms by the slaves directed by the _vīlica_ (§148), cloth of any desired quality could be bought in the open market. It was formerly supposed that the garments came from the loom ready to wear, but this is now known to have been incorrect. We have seen that the tunic was made of two separate pieces sewed together (§236), that the toga had probably to be fitted as carefully as a modern coat (§243), and that even the coarse _paenula_ (§248) could not have been woven or knitted in one piece. But ready-made garments were on sale in the towns as early as the time of Cato, though perhaps of the cheaper qualities only, and in the Empire the trade reached large proportions. It is remarkable that with the vast numbers of slaves in the _familia urbāna_ (§149 f.) it never became usual to have soiled garments cleansed at home. All garments showing traces of use were sent by the well-to-do to the fullers (_fullōnēs_) to be washed (Fig. 106), whitened (or re-dyed), and pressed. The fact that almost all were of woolen materials made skill and care all the more necessary. [Illustration: FIGURE 106. FULLERS AT WORK] CHAPTER VIII FOOD AND MEALS REFERENCES: Marquardt, 264-268, 300-340, 414-465; Voigt, 327-329, 401-404; Göll, 311-454; Guhl and Koner, 747-759, 702-704; Friedländer, III, 29-56; Ramsay, 490-501; Pauly-Wissowa, _cēna_, _comissātiō_; Smith, Harper, Rich, _cēna_, _comissātiō_, _olea_ (_olīva_), _vīnum_; Baumeister, 845, 2086; Lübker, 724 f.; Mau-Kelsey, 256-260, 267-270. §272. Natural Conditions.--Italy is blessed above all the other countries of central Europe with the natural conditions that go to make an abundant and varied supply of food. The soil is rich and composed of different elements in different parts of the country. The rainfall is abundant, and rivers and smaller streams are numerous. The line of greatest length runs nearly north and south, but the climate depends little upon latitude, being modified by surrounding bodies of water, by mountain ranges, and by prevailing winds. These agencies in connection with the varying elevation of the land itself produce such widely different conditions that somewhere within the confines of Italy almost all the grains and fruits of the temperate and subtropic zones find the soil and climate most favorable to their growth.