FOREIGN PRODUCE. SUMMARIES. 



725 



of the period 1401-1540 being taken as unity. That of 

 Indian produce is r88, but there are circumstances connected 

 with the Indian trade to which I have made reference already, 

 the extraordinary rise in the price of all such produce after the 

 conquest of Egypt by Selim the First. Had the records before 

 1520 been compared with those in 1521-82, the contrast would 

 have been far more striking. 



I have now gone through those principal articles the prices of 

 which are recorded in the third volume, and tabulated in the 

 present. It will now complete the contrast if I sum up the 

 various heads under which I have presented the results of my 

 facts to the reader. 



Ratio of rise between 1540-1 582 under the following heads : 



I. Live stock and poultry . . . 2-62 



II. Grain of all kinds .... 2-40 



III. Farm produce and salt . . . 2-53 



IV. Labour, mechanical and agri- 



cultural I -60 



V. Fish 1-62 



VI. Fuel 1-71 



VII. Building materials and nails . 1.71 



VIII. Metals 1-88 



IX. Linen 2-08 



X. Clothing 2-12 



XI. Paper and Parchment . . . 1-50 



XII. Foreign produce, western . . 2-03 



XIII. Foreign produce, Indian . . 1-88 



It will be clear from these facts that the producer of animal 

 food, grain, and other agricultural necessaries commanded a 

 better market than the dealer in any other article of value 

 did, and that, as I have stated above, labour and those commo- 

 dities the value of which was principally derived from labour, 

 partook in the least degree of that rise which was effected in 

 all commodities alike, glass alone excepted. That it was 

 exceedingly difficult to raise rents, is, I think, proved, not only 

 by the actual record of the Corpus rent-roll, but from the in- 

 direct manner in which landowners strove to better their 

 condition, by demanding corn payments in lieu of money, a 

 custom begun early in the eastern counties, and enforced on 

 corporations under 18 Eliz., cap. 6 (1576), a statute which was 

 certainly not acted on for six years ; and by demanding fines l 



1 The oldest fine which I have found in those documents which I have inspected is 

 in !533 ( Vo1 - IIJ > P- 682, ii), when King's College receives 50 from the Earl of Derby, 

 s his ' fine for introit to Prescot.' 



