52 THE RATE OF PRODUCTION IN THE 



Elham. Peas nearly three times at Maldon; to have little 

 more than returned the seed at Letherhead ; to have given 

 more than five times at Farley ; at Elham the record corn- 

 fuses the tithe taken with the produce, for, while a small 

 quantity was sown, the apparent produce is far too large 

 for possibility, and vetches are given as gathered, while 

 none are sown ; at Gamlingay rather more than three and 

 a half; at Cheddington about three times; at Wolford nearly 

 nine times ; at Cuxham peas produce rather more than seven 

 times ; at Basingstoke three times. Lastly, vetches are al- 

 most a failure at Letherhead and Cuxham ; return nearly 

 three times at Farley ; and nearly six and three-fourths at 

 Basingstoke. 



This rate of production will be found to sustain little or 

 no variation in the subsequent years, both in respect to 

 quantities and localities. The crops at Wolford, Cuxham, 

 and Holywell are relatively heavy : those of other localities 

 are uniformly light. It cannot be doubted that the lands held 

 by the lord in the manor were the best and most fertile ; and 

 Merton College had the manorial rights in almost all their 

 estates. But out of eleven estates three only possess what, 

 in our time, would be considered very moderate fertility, as 

 gathered from the record of what was actually housed in 

 four of the cheapest consecutive years known in the four- 

 teenth century. 



Winter roots and artificial grasses were, as I have said 

 before, entirely unknown. Hence stock was always starved 

 in winter. The practice was to keep the oxen, and to kill 

 down sheep to the largest number which could be maintained 

 from the produce of the farm, that is, from its winter pas- 

 ture, and such hay as could be spared for their subsistence. 

 The number of sheep, therefore, which appears in the table 

 of stock given above, since the record was given at Michael- 

 mas, that is, before the stock was reduced, is high. The 

 sheep, too, must have been small. The price at which they 

 are commonly sold, even taking into account the general 



