282 ON THE PRICE OF LABOUR. 



1318, that is, during the time of the famine. After the pesti- 

 lence the value of women's labour is doubled, and it is as rare 

 to find female labour paid at less than id. a day as it is to find 

 it at less than a penny before that time. 



There is plenty of information as to some of the services 

 rendered by farriers. The sow-gelder plies his trade, generally 

 at a farthing for male pigs, and rather more for female. These 

 rates are at the conclusion of the period. Notes will be found 

 of the treatment of horses, by the veterinary practitioner of 

 the time (called the marshal, i.e. mareschallus), though of course 

 his payment varied with the disease for which he was con- 

 sulted. There seems to have been no serious complaint in 

 the case of the eight stotts who were cured in the lump at 

 about id. a piece in 1268, or in that of the horse who was 

 treated for $d. at the same time. The lameness of the Ibstone 

 carthorse in 1286 was of a more serious character. In 1313 

 the Cheddington stable seems to have been afflicted with 

 pneumonia, and if the bailiff's report be true, that the horses 

 were cured, the marshal of that time must have possessed a 

 secret of successful treatment. We see in 1385 that at 

 Eastchurch firing was used to cure horses of spavin. We 

 cannot tell what was the proportion, in the gross sum of 4^., 

 which the operation of taking a c lampas' out of a horse's 

 mouth at Oxford in 1319 bore to the further service of shoeing 

 him ; or, as the sum is paid without naming the number sub- 

 jected to the operation, what was the rate of bloodletting in 

 1400. 



Once we read of a surgeon called in to treat one of the 

 founder's-kin boys at Merton College. He is paid (1307), vol. ii. 

 p. 578. iii., 6d. for his services. 



Moles are caught at Caynham and Parva Humbra in York- 

 shire in 1325. The mole-catcher at the former place gets is. 

 the hundred for old moles, is. $d. for young ones; the rate 

 at Parva Humbra for the latter being is. lod. I am not aware 

 whether a similar tariff prevails at present. Rats are caught 

 at Weston in 1297, in Oxford on two occasions, in 1335 and 



