LAND CARRIAGE. 767 



for the carriage by land of 104 pairs, for which it paid 14 5^. 

 The land carriage is now 6s. Sd. for the parcel, or about 3^. yi. 

 for the short hundred. In 1603 the purchase is of the same 

 quantity apparently, though the account does not say that there 

 were 104 pairs. It gives nearly the price though, i.e. 14 6s. Sd., 

 and I have no doubt that it was the same quantity as in the 

 year before, though the price of fish this year is certainly high. 

 On this occasion the carriage by land is Js. Sd. In 1604, 

 100 are bought at 14 6s. &/., and the land carriage is '/s. In 

 1607, 130 are bought for ;i8 5^., and the land carriage is 

 4J. 6d. These prices, if there was any uniformity in the 

 weight of the quantities, seem to indicate a carrier's charges 

 and a bargain with the carrier at Burcot on each occasion. 



This inference is I think supported by the cost which this 

 College was put to in another transaction overthe same ground. 

 In 1599 Magdalen College bought 225 wainscots, of three 

 different sizes and prices (which it paid for in 1600), in London, 

 at an aggregate price of 26 i$s. Sd. It had them conveyed 

 from London to Burcot, and thence to Oxford in fourteen 

 loads at 4^. the load. Taking the load at a ton, the land 

 carriage then was a fraction under 6d. a ton per mile. But on 

 no conceivable interpretation could the fish have been carried 

 at this rate. 



Occasionally the Oxford Colleges procured slate from 

 Guiting in Gloucestershire. The distance appears to be 

 nearly forty miles. In 1588, 1590, 1591, 1594, 1597 and 1599, 

 the cost of the carriage is 5^. the load. In 1601 it is $s. $d. 

 These are the only entries which I have found. I conclude 

 that the growing cost of carriage discouraged the use of this 

 distant material, and finally brought about its discontinuance in 

 Oxford. The purchases are always made by Corpus Christi, 

 to which College Guiting belonged. 



In 1627 and 1630 New College buys slate and hewn eves, 

 and undertakes their carriage from Shipton, this being I con- 

 clude Shipton-on-Cherwell, almost seven miles due north of 

 Oxford. It pays 3 s. <\d. a load, each being said to be of six 



