THE PRICE OF LIVE STOCK. 339 



muttons or wethers, during the last forty-two years at least, 

 is entirely that of consumption by opulent corporations and by 

 the Crown, and that as the highest price is taken, this being of 

 the sheep in May or a little later, i. e. just before shearing time, 

 the price includes that of the woolfell which was afterwards 

 sold. I do not find that mutton was often bought by the stone as 

 beef was, though King's College, Cambridge, sometimes made 

 bargains for the supply of sheep at factitious prices, apparently 

 with the view of indirectly raising the rent of its land. 



The entries of the price of ewes are broken. In the first 140 

 years ewes are represented sufficiently for the purpose of de- 

 riving an average from the highest price, this process neutralis- 

 ing the inference which would be drawn from a general average, 

 in which animals sold out of the flock as unserviceable were 

 included. But the entries are very few for the last 42 years. 

 The result is i s. $\d. in the first part of the period, $s. 8d. in 

 the second. The latter price does not differ widely from the 

 averages derived from muttons or wethers. Hoggs are even 

 less fully represented than ewes, but the two averages do not 

 present any marked variations from those of other animals. 

 Lambs are more plentiful. But in the latter part of the period 

 such lambs as were bought were invariably procured for the 

 table, and generally purchased at or about Easter or Pentecost, 

 were no doubt early droppings, which had been specially fattened 

 for the market, and were therefore dear. 



SWINE. These were the most important articles of flesh 

 food to the medieval peasant, as they are indeed to his 

 descendant in our own day. I have not been able to procure 

 as full and precise information about this animal in the present 

 as I did in the previous volumes ; but in one particular, the 

 price of boars, I am able to supply much fuller and more 

 regular evidence, chiefly from the consumption of the Oxford 

 and Cambridge Colleges. Boars appear to have been bought 

 for the Christmas feast, and to judge from the price, must have 

 been fattened with care and cost. I have found them without 

 a break till 1483. Another gap occurs in 1493. Information 



Z 2 



