>* OP THE « 



CJHIVERSITY] 



HUSBANDRY. 



This is the treatise on husbandry that a good man once 

 made, whose name was Sir Walter of Henley ; and this he made 

 to teach those who have lands and tenements and may not 

 know how to keep all the points of husbandry, as the tillage of 

 land and the keeping of cattle, from which great wealth may 

 come to those who will hear this teaching and then do as is 

 found written herein. 



The father having fallen into old age said to his son, 

 Dear son, live prudently towards God and the world. With 

 regard to God, think often of the passion and death that 

 Jesus Christ suffered for us, and love Him above all things 

 and fear Him and lay hold of and keep His command- 

 ments; with regard to the world, think of the wheel of 

 fortune, how man mounts little by little to wealth, and 

 when he is at the top of the wheel, then by mishap he falls 

 little by little into poverty, and then into wretchedness. 

 Wherefore, I pray you, order your life according as your 

 lands are valued yearly by the extent, and nothing beyond 

 that. If you can approve your lands by tillage or 

 cattle or other means beyond the extent, put the surplus 

 in reserve, for if corn fail, or cattle die, or fire befall you, 

 or other mishap, then what you have saved will help you. 

 If you spend in a year the value of your lands and the 

 profit, and one of these chances befall you, you have no 

 recovery except by borrowing, and he who borrows from 

 another robs himself; or by making bargains, as some who 

 make themselves merchants, buying at twenty shillings and 

 selling at ten. It is said in the proverb, ' Who provides 

 for the future enjoys himself in the present.' You see some 

 who have lands and tenements and know not how to live. 



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