46 ENCLOSURES OF THE FIFTEENTH III 



the grievances mentioned in the Grand Remonstrance. This 

 document may have referred to enclosure of the waste, or 

 fens, since we know that this caused great discontent from 

 the scheme started by the Dutchman Vermuyden in the 

 reign of Charles I/ down to the period of the Common- 

 wealth itself, discontent which had much to do with the 

 rise of the Levellers. 2 And this kind of enclosure, although 

 it interfered with the rights, or supposed rights, of the 

 fenmen, stands on an altogether different footing from the 

 enclosure of the common field. 



Yet that there was much enclosing of the common field 

 in the seventeenth century is rendered the more probable 

 because evidently a change was coming in the view of the 

 legislature and in the writers of the period. In the year 

 1619 the price of corn was low, and accordingly a procla- 

 mation was issued stating that the tillage laws had become 

 the opportunity of informers rather than useful restrictions, 

 and a commission was appointed to grant pardons to offen- 

 ders, while in 1629 the tillage laws of the Tudor times 

 were repealed, with the exception of 25 Henry VIII, c. 13, 

 which limited the number of sheep which a man might 

 keep, and the Act 39 Elizabeth, c. 2, 1597, which referred 

 to the twenty-four counties where the previous agitation 

 had been greatest. It is true, however, that when in 

 1629-31 the price of corn again rose the Privy Council 

 ordered that all enclosures of the last two years should be 

 removed, and the Star Chamber instituted proceedings 



1 In 1680. The Duke of Bedford with thirteen gentlemen 

 venturers undertook to drain the southern fens. 



a Scrutton, Commons, c. iii. By the statutes of Merton, 1236, and < 

 Westminster, 1285 ; by the second the lord was entitled to enclose or 

 ' approve ' part of the waste so long as he left sufficient pasture for 

 the freehold tenants of the manor, and by custom the rights of copy- 

 holders were subsequently reserved. In the enclosure of the fens 

 the commoners' rights were considered, but not sufficiently, in the 

 opinion of the fenmen. 



