obscurity, either because their numbers had increased, or because
their position had become more stable, or because they were
ready, after mature preparation, to play their part in the
intellectual world.

At this time, the Jews of Northern France nearly without
exception enjoyed happy conditions of existence. From their
literature, rather scholarly than popular, we learn chiefly of
their schools and their rabbis; yet we also learn from it that
their employments were the same as those of the other inhabitants
of the country. They were engaged in trade, many attaining
wealth; and a number devoted themselves to agriculture. They
possessed fields and vineyards, for neither the ownership of land
nor residence in the country was forbidden them; and they were
also employed in cattle raising. Often they took Christians into
their service.

But the Jews, although they attached themselves to the soil and
tried to take root there, were essentially an urban population.
They owned real estate and devoted themselves to all sorts of
industries. They were allowed to be workmen and to practice every
handicraft, inasmuch as the guilds, those associations, partly
religious in character, which excluded the Jews from their
membership rolls, did not begin to be established until the
twelfth century. Sometimes a Jew was entrusted with a public
office, as a rule that of collector of taxes. Not until later,
about the twelfth century, when forced by men and circumstances,
did the Jews make a specialty of moneylending.

The strength of the Jews resided in the fact that they were