The Rural Classes of England. 223 



payment of a fixed sum of money, some by a personal service 

 of an honorable nature, as, for instance, holding' the towel 

 while the Lord Abbot is washing on the day of St. 

 Peter and Paul. These three forms of tenure would appear to 

 be respectively Knight service, free socage and the ^'- alio 

 modo " referred to in the statute. In a few cases there is agri- 

 cultural labor in addition to the money payment, but this 

 labor is of the highest class of agricultural operations, and is 

 always moderate and fixed in amount: as, "he shall gather 

 and carry hay for four days." ^ The tenure likewise varies in 

 form and degree ; some hold by deed, some by ancient tenure, 

 some for life, some at the will of the lord. What they all 

 agree in, is in the services being free and honorable in charac- 

 ter, and, except the military, fixed in amount and time. The 

 number of this class differs widely in the different manors — in 

 some there are only one or two, in others a considerable num- 

 ber. 



In a few manors there come next to the free tenants, the ten- 

 ants of Jlonilond, that is " Honey-land ; " whose estates are 

 small, and whose rent is a certain amount of honey, e. g., one 

 gallon to each acre.^ This is of course an equally free and cer- 

 tain service — equally socage — with those before described ; the 

 tenants of Honilond fall, therefore, in the class of free tenants — 

 as their position in the register would indicate. 



Next come the Co7isuetudinarn, the largest, and, in a sense, 

 the most important class. In this class, instead of the irregu- 

 larity of the free tenants, we find the greatest possible regular- 

 ity and uniformity ; all (with very slight exceptions) hold an 

 equal amount of laud (or at least an amount proportionate in 

 quantity), and are subject to the same services. The custom- 

 ary land, terra co7isuetudinaria, is 'inva.T\a.h\y given by virgaks, 

 and the virgata varies very widely in extent.' I find ten differ- 



> Extenta de Hynetone, p. 55. 



2 Extenta de Clifforde, p. 51. 



* Extenta de Ledene, p. 128. 



« It is always one-fourth of a hide. The hide being a variable quantity. 



