THE COMPANIONAGE.
246
moment upon
Let us reflect one
the position of the building trade in Gaul after the
must have languished.
The barbarians wanted no stone
villas or castles.
But by degrees the Church would find employment for the craftsmen, and
ill tlie
first few centuries we may
suppose them wholly employed in erecting ecclesiastical
expulsion of the Eomans.
It
These must have been the Children of Solomon.
monuments.
as
In course of time a
less
and ruder masonry would be required in the cities at first chiefly for fortifications,
the dwellings were still of wood. The builders of these wooden dwellings were probably the
finished
;
Sons of Soubise, and if so, we he