ON THE PRICE OF GRAIN. 



also explains the high price of vetches. The harvest must have been 

 abundant and of good quality. 



1423-4. The harvest is practically of the same character with 

 the preceding, the evidence, though not so wide, being of a similar 

 kind. The highest prices are in the eastern counties. The same 

 facts apply to barley ; and it would appear from the difference between 

 the prices of barley and malt, that good qualities of the former were 

 comparatively scarce, though the principal and largest purchases and 

 sales of malt are in Cambridge and Norfolk. The price of oats is 

 low, and the quality is good, for seed oats are bought in dear localities 

 at cheap rates, and the price of meal falls even as low as 6s. Sd. Rye 

 is fairly analogous to wheat. There is no entry of the price of beans. 

 Peas, vetches, and pulse are cheap. 



1424-5. There is a slight rise in the price of wheat. It is 

 considerably dearer in the eastern counties, but cheap in the south 

 and Midlands. Barley is slightly cheaper, and as the price of malt is 

 lower must have been of better quality. Oats are at exactly the same 

 price as in the previous year, and the quality must have been as good 

 or better, as the rate of seed oats and meal is low. There is an entry 

 of oat malt at a high price, but this, apart from the cost of manu- 

 facture, must have been of very superior quality. Rye follows the 

 price of wheat. The prices of beans, peas, pulse, and vetches present 

 nothing worthy of special note. The average price of malt at the 

 twenty-two Cambridge entries is 3^. iof</., which fairly represents the 

 proportion of barley and malt. The general average is elevated by 

 the price of eleven quarters purchased at Jarrow. 



1425-6. The cost of wheat is still lower, having fallen within a 

 fraction to that at which it stood twenty-one years before. In all 

 places but two cheap, it sinks to 2s. Sd. in two places remote from 

 each other, and the average would have been lower had it not been 

 for the rates realised at Ormesby. Oats are still cheaper, and the price 

 of oatmeal falls to 6s. for a time. 



1426-7. There is a further slight fall in wheat. The evidence, 

 though far from large, is fairly wide and representative. The harvest 

 must have been very abundant and have been generally so. Barley is 

 only a little less than wheat Drage is not found. Oats vary little from 

 the prices of the previous three years, but oatmeal is a trifle dearer. 

 Rye, from two entries, is slightly lower than wheat. Beans, peas, 

 and pulse are at normal prices. The low price of malt at Cambridge, 

 3-r. 8f d., points to good quality of barley. 



1427-8. The price of wheat is still low, though a slight rise has 



