322 MINOR AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS. 



accounts is the earliest, in 1593, when this fruit is only 2s. %d. 

 the quarter. The next in cheapness is that to which I have 

 already referred, the early apples of 1696. Of the other 

 entries, twenty-two in number, two are between los. and 20.$-., 

 one is above 40^., and the rest are between zis. ^d. and $6s. 

 The commonest price is 32^. Among apples I find codlins, 

 by a strange measure, the quartern, by which is probably 

 meant the quarter of a bushel. 



The highest priced fruit is that of some kinds of cherries, 

 especially those which are called * preserving cherries.' The 

 early fruit is also dear. But preserving cherries are at 6d. 

 and 6\d. the Ib. even as early as 1602 and 1603, when the 

 ordinary fruit is at id. and 2,\d. At Mendham in 1639 cherries 

 cost in July nearly %\d. a pound, the highest which I have 

 seen, with the exception of an entry of Duke cherries in 1686 

 at is. a pound. It is difficult to imagine that these can have 

 been of home growth. Black cherries are bought in 1687 at 

 $\d. a pound. A few more entries are among the ' Sundries '. 



Strawberries are seldom found. They are at a little over 

 $d. a pint on June 6th, 1593, and at $d. a pint on June 8th. 

 In the next year they are at ^d. a pint on June loth. These 

 are London prices, paid by a merchant living in Bassishaw 

 ward of the city. 



Raspberries and gooseberries are native plants, which grew 

 no doubt more plentifully in the woods during the seventeenth 

 century than they do in the nineteenth; and it is highly pro- 

 bable that the entries in 1593 and 1594, of %d. a quart for 

 the former and 3^. for the latter, paid by the London mer- 

 chant referred to above, were collected by the country folk. 



Damsons, the only plums besides skeggs which are given in 

 the accounts, are quoted at 85^. 4^. the quarter in 1602, and 

 at 88j. in 1685, the former rate being paid in Oxford, the 

 latter in Winchester. Skeggs are collected and sold at 4s. 

 the quarter. 



There are a few prices of walnuts, by the hundred and by the 

 bushel. Two of the former measure give an average of 8<, 



