make together seventy-eight days, and if to these we add the holidays at Christmas, Easter, and other Bank and public “closings,” we shall find that our annual breaks in the working year are not very far from the Roman total, however differently they may be distributed.  The difference between us and them lies rather in the way in which the holidays were employed.  Originally the holidays did not imply any giving of shows and games in the way of chariot-races, gladiatorial combats, and the like.  They were simply festivals of deities—­of Flora, the goddess of flowers, Ceres, the goddess of crops, Apollo the god of light and healing, and other divinities—­honoured by sacrifices, processions, and feasts.  The feast of Saturn, for example, was at first held for only one day.  Later it was extended over five and then over seven days, exactly as our Christmas celebrations—­which are a Christian adaptation of it—­tend virtually to spread over longer and longer periods.  At this winter festival of the Saturnalia there was an interchange of presents—­such as confectionery, game, articles of clothing, writing-tablets—­and a general outburst of goodwill and merriment.  For one day the slaves were allowed to put on the freeman’s cap, the “cap of liberty,” and to pretend to be the masters.  This is the source of the mediaeval monkish custom of permitting one annual day of “misrule.”  Meanwhile the citizen threw off the toga and clad himself in colours as he chose.  He played at dice publicly and with impunity.  The cry of “Hurrah for the Saturnalia!” was heard everywhere.  Later it became customary to hold public shows on these days, and the emperors gave gladiatorial games and acrobatic or dramatic entertainments, at which there were scrambled various objects, articles of food, coins or tickets entitling the holder to some gift which might be valuable, valueless, or comical.  Similarly there was a holiday on New Year’s Day, when presents were again interchanged, regularly including a small piece of money “for good luck.”  The gifts on this day frequently bore the inscription “a Happy and Prosperous New Year to you.”  Presents at all times played a prominent part in Roman etiquette and sociality.  Not only were they given at holidays but also at all important domestic events.  Even at a dinner-party, besides actual articles of food to be carried home, there were frequently gifts of a kind either expressly adapted to the recipient, or else drawn by a humorous lottery.  Among numerous other articles of which one might be the recipient in various seasons and circumstances, there are mentioned books, pictures, tablets of ivory, wood, or parchment, cushions, mufflers, hats, hoods, sponges, soap, rings, flasks, baskets, musical instruments, balls, pens, lamps, tooth-picks, dice, money-boxes, satchels, parrots, magpies, and monkeys.  On the Ides of March the poorer classes made their way to the Campus Martius beside the river, built themselves arbours or wigwams of boughs, and spent the day and evening in riotous song and jollity.