were concentrated in Rome; Cato, for
instance, advises the Campanian landowner to purchase the slaves'
clothing and shoes, the ploughs, vats, and locks, which he may
require, in Rome. From the great consumption of woollen stuffs the
manufacture of cloth must undoubtedly have been extensive and
lucrative.(17) But no endeavours were apparently made to transplant
to Italy any such professional industry as existed in Egypt and Syria,
or even merely to carry it on abroad with Italian capital. Flax
indeed was cultivated in Italy and purple dye was prepared there,
but the latter branch of industry at least belonged essentially
to the Greek Tarentum, and probably the import of Egyptian linen
and Milesian or Tyrian purple even now preponderated everywhere over
the native manufacture.

Under this category, however, falls to some extent the leasing or
purchase by Roman capitalists of landed estates beyond Italy, with
a view to carry on the cultivation of grain and the rearing of cattle
on a great scale. This species of speculation, which afterwards
developed to proportions so enormous, probably began particularly in
Sicily, within the period now before us; seeing that the commercial
restrictions imposed on the Siceliots,(18) if not introduced for
the very purpose, must have at least tended to give to the Roman
speculators, who were exempt from such restrictions, a sort of
monopoly of the profits derivable from land.

Management of Business by Slaves

Business in all these different branches was uniformly carried on by
means of slaves. The money-lenders and bankers instituted, throughout
the range of their business, additional counting-houses and branch
banks under the direction of their slaves and freedmen. The company,
which had leased the customs-duties from the state, appointed chiefly
its slaves and freedmen to levy them at each custom-house. Every one
who took contracts for buildings bought architect-slaves; every one
who undertook to provide spectacles or gladiatorial games on account
of those giving them purchased or trained a company of slaves skilled
in acting, or a band of serfs expert in the trade of fighting. The
merchant imported his wares in vessels of his own under the charge
of slaves or freedmen, and disposed of them by the same means in
wholesale or retail. We need hardly add that the working of mines and
manufactories was conducted entirely by slaves. The situation of
these slaves was, no doubt, fa