ON THE PRICE OF LABOUR. 389 



given to the cowherd ; the same quantity to the shepherd, with 

 a similar reservation, that in this year he kept other people's 

 sheep ; three bushels to the daye ; one bushel to the pig-keeper. 

 Three bushels of the same quality are given to one thresher, 

 one bushel to another. One bushel is given to the sowers. 

 The reapers, i. e. the customary tenants working on labour- 

 rents, had a custom of four bushels made into bread, and two 

 quarters and six bushels are consumed during the time of 

 harvest. These allowances are, it will be remembered, irre- 

 spective of the payment made by the bailiff for reaping by 

 the acre. 



In estimating the value of services by the corn prices given in 

 this volume, it will be remembered that except on some occa- 

 sions, the fact of which is expressly noted, the corn sold or 

 bought is always of the best quality. The accounts which 

 I have consulted invariably distinguish best from inferior corn. 

 It is important to observe this, because when contrasts are 

 made between past and present rates of remuneration in wages, 

 and corn averages are consulted, it is not always remembered 

 that these latter are founded on the price at which all corn 

 which changes hands in a market is sold. But the variation 

 between the highest and the lowest prices of grain sold in any 

 market rarely falls within 15 per cent. 



If we attempt to estimate the income of a first-rate agri- 

 cultural labourer, as a ploughman or carter, so as to interpret 

 them to some degree at least in modern values, we may take his 

 money wages before the Plague at 7*. 6d. a year. We may 

 reckon that he has a quarter of corn every nine weeks, and 

 though, as we have seen, the money average of wheat is 5*. io|^., 

 let us conceive that it is mixed with barley and rye in the 

 allowances made to the servants in such proportions as to 

 make the market value of the mixtil no more than 4^. 4^. His 

 corn allowance would then be worth about ^i 4*. 8^. His 

 harvest allowances would be worth y. more. If his wife worked 

 a hundred days in the year, her labour would add 8*. 4^. more 

 to his resources ; if one of his boys worked also for the same 



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