GENERAL DISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH. 109, 



which is now reckoned an English, was then a Welsh county, 

 and was governed and taxed upon a different system from that 

 to which the greater part of England was subject. 



With these exceptions, the counties are stated in alpha- 

 betical order in the first column. The second column gives 

 the quantity actually assessed on each county; in the case of 

 Yorkshire, on each of the three rithings, as they are called in 

 the original. Four towns are also separately assessed, one of 

 which, York, is still treated as a county with its own acreage 

 in the population returns. 



The third column contains the value of the wool rated 

 at ^4 the sack. This estimate is not a very high one; we 

 shall find below that the evidence collected for the price 

 of wool in the year 1341, and chiefly taken from the southern 

 counties, gives $ is. 8*/. the sack. 



The fourth column gives the proportion between the tax and 

 the modern acreage, that is to say, Bedfordshire contributed a 

 sack to each 800 acres, Berkshire one to 835, and so on. The 

 fifth column is the acreage of each county taken from the last 

 census report. The amount, value, and proportion of all the 

 counties enumerated is supplied at the end of the table. 



The foot-notes give the estimate of the proportion when 

 each of the four towns separately assessed in the original are 

 reckoned with the county in which they are situated. 



In the second table the same counties are taken, and a 

 calculation given of the rate at which each county was assessed 

 in the income-tax return of 1 860, the figures representing the 

 pounds and decimals of pounds to four numbers at which the 

 acreage of each county was valued. Thus Bedfordshire is 

 assessed at 1 is. ^\d. the acre, and so on. It seemed better 

 to give the value in decimal quantities, than in pounds, 

 shillings, and pence. As in the first table, a general average 

 is given of the annual value of all the counties assessed to the 

 tax, and included in the list. 



