ve shops attached to
them, and there is a painting in the grand work on Herculaneum, Le
Pitture d'Ercolano, which represents a bread-seller established in the
Forum, with his goods on a little table in the open air.

There is only one trade, so far as we are aware, with respect to the
practices of which any knowledge has been gained from the excavations
at Pompeii--that of fulling and scouring cloth. This art, owing to the
difference of ancient and modern habits, was of much greater
importance formerly than it now is. Wool was almost the only material
used for dresses in the earlier times of Rome, silk being unknown till
a late period, and linen garments being very little used. Woolen
dresses, however, especially in the hot climate of Italy, must often
have required a thorough purification, and on the manner in which this
was done of course their beauty very much depended. And since the
toga, the chief article of Roman costume, was woven in one piece, and
was of course expensive, to make it look and wear as well as possible
was very necessary to persons of small fortune. The method pursued has
been described by Pliny and others, and is well illustrated in some
paintings found upon the wall of a building, which evidently was a
_fullonica_, or scouring-house. The building in question is entered
from the Street of Mercury, and is situated in the same island as the
House of the Tragic Poet.

The first operation was that of washing, which was done with water
mixed with some detergent clay, or fuller's earth; soap does not
appear to have been used. This was done in vats, where the clothes
were trodden and well worked by the feet of the scourer. The painting
on the walls of the Fullonica represents four persons thus employed.
Their dress is tucked up, leaving their legs bare; it consists of two
tunics, the under one being yellow and the upper green. Three of them
seem to have done their work, and to be wringing the articles on which
they have been employed; the other, his hands resting on the wall on
each side, is jumping, and busily working about the contents of his
vat. When dry, the cloth was brushed and carded, to raise the nap--at
first with metal cards, afterwards with thistles. A plant called
teazle is now largely cultivated in England for the same purpose. The
cloth was then fumigated with sulphur, and bleached in the sun by
throwing water repeatedly upon it while spread out on gratings. In the
painting the workman i