CHARGES OF THE STABLE. 527 



milk cheese was made, a small rent for ewes, the landlord 

 finding pasture, and the tenant apparently engaging to restore 

 the animal at the end of the year, by pledging himself to bear 

 losses. The increasing adoption of this custom explains the 

 fact, not only of the scanty information as to dairy produce 

 at the conclusion of the fourteenth century, but also of the 

 lack of evidence as to the price of dairy utensils. 



I apprehend that the origin of this custom is to be found 

 in the difficulty which must have attended on any attempt 

 made to take account of dairy produce. The profits of agricul- 

 ture were small, and the method of farming, necessarily carried 

 on in early times with the lord's capital and by his bailiff, was 

 no doubt less productive than that of a peasant or yeoman 

 managing his holding on his own account. A loss on any 

 important item was serious, and might compromise the profits 

 of the whole year. Now it was not difficult to exercise super- 

 vision over harvest produce ; and thus we find very frequently, 

 especially in years of scarcity, that the lord was present either 

 in person, or by a deputy whom he could trust, during the time 

 of harvest, in order to inspect and take stock of the year's 

 produce. Similarly, there were ready means for securing full 

 intelligence as to the state of the cattle, and generally of the 

 sheep and other live stock on the farm. But it was all but 

 impossible to put any effectual check on the management of 

 the dairy, unless the owner was resident on the manor, or was 

 close at hand. The monks at Wolrichston could, and did, up 

 to the last years of the fourteenth century, and indeed for some 

 time afterwards, manage the dairy on their home farm; but 

 the case was very different with a non-resident proprietor. 

 Hence they let their cows, the tenant taking milk and calf, 

 at rates considerably less than those which Walter de Henley 

 reckons as the annual profit on each head in a dairy farm. 



CHARGES OF THE STABLE. The chief expenditure incurred 

 in the keep of horses is the cost of shoeing. In the earlier 

 part of the period shoes were occasionally made out of the 

 iron purchased by the bailiff, and fashioned by the village 



