222 ON THE PRICE OF GRAIN. 



it is low in the Eastern counties, if we can take the Cambridge account 

 as sufficient evidence, for one purchase at a Cambridge college is as 

 low as 2s. 8d. The Heyford Warren rent charge is reckoned at 

 5.?. 4<t., i.e. on November i. The price of barley is not quite so low, 

 proportionately, as wheat, but the average is raised by the northern 

 price, as is proved by the price of malt. Drage, of which a large 

 quantity is sold at Pershore, is proportionately lower, as might be 

 expected when prices were yielding. Rye at $s. 9! d. is exalted in the 

 same way that wheat is, and for the same reasons. Oats are on an 

 average of 2s. 2\d., and oatmeal at 7^. %\d. I have found one price 

 of beans, but none of vetches. But peas are at %s. id., and pulse 

 at 2s. In the case of pulse, I have ventured on concluding that the 

 entry means vetches. 



1404-5. The price of wheat is still lower, and, with one exception, 

 is very uniform. It is as low as 2S. at Charlbury in Oxfordshire, and 

 apparently through the year, as one price is given in June, the other 

 after the account was drawn up, and therefore after the harvest of 

 1405. The prices are a little higher on the eastern side of England. 

 But the evidence is to the effect that there was an abundant harvest. 

 Rye is even lower than the proportion. Barley is not so cheap as 

 wheat, or as it might be expected to be. The same comment can be 

 made on oats. Beans (of which one entry alone is found), peas, and 

 pulse are very cheap. The disproportion is perfectly in accord with 

 what is generally to be found in cheap years. 



1405-6. The price of wheat sinks again, the average being 

 3^. g%d. In some places it is very low, a considerable quantity being 

 purchased at Cambridge at a little over 3^., and only a little less at 

 Charlbury in Oxfordshire at 2s. The range of information too is 

 wide. The sales at Lullington, being the quantity debited at market 

 prices to the steward of Battle Abbey, are large, and indicate that the 

 produce at this estate was exceptionally abundant. The chaldron 

 bought at Wearmouth is also low-priced. The year contains a large 

 purchase made by the Countess of Warwick, which, as the quality was 

 likely to be the best, is similarly illustrative of a plentiful harvest. 

 Barley is also cheap, and drage delivered from those localities is 

 equally low-priced. The price of rye, oats, and beans is also low, 

 the quantity of oats sold at Hornchurch being very large, viz. 320 

 quarters. It must have been a year of great plenty, prices being but 

 little in excess of those in the three abundant years, 1392-4 inclusive. 



1406-7. Prices rise a little in this year, though not to any notable 

 degree, no entry being made of exceptional cheapness. They are 



