THE TENANT-FARMER, 1583-1702. 817 



and oats los. 9^., pays his bailiff and shepherd $6 a year 1 . 

 Let us put the maintenance of the farmer and his family at 

 30, and he has 37 us. remaining as profit on his capital, 

 for a sinking fund and for risk the risk being often great. 



That the farmer had other and minor products from his 

 farm is highly probable. He may have kept a small flock of 

 sheep and a few cattle. But my hypothesis is that his farm 

 was principally arable and corn land, and I am persuaded, if 

 the profits of his live stock were but represented by the manure 

 which he obtained by keeping them, and was necessary for 

 the cultivation of the soil, these profits were more than ab- 

 sorbed in the cost of seed-corn, a most important item in the 

 scanty production of this period. On a large farm, with ex- 

 tensive pastures or commons, several or enclosed meadows 

 and wide sheep-runs, the raising of cattle was no doubt, a 

 source of considerable profit. Lord Lovell in 1732 received 

 ^486 i6s. %d. from the sale of corn, 579 $s. $d. from the sale 

 of cattle, sheep, pigs, hides and wool. I have no doubt, from 

 the accounts which Lord Leicester has lent me of his ancestor's 

 agriculture, from 1731 to 1735 inclusive, that the area which 

 Lord Lovell held was not less than 1500 acres, and perhaps 

 more, i.e. 7! times more than the hypothetical holding which 

 I have been commenting on. 



The estimates made by Gregory King suppose that England 

 and Wales contained nine million acres of arable land, and 

 twelve million of meadow and pasture. These calculations 

 are vague, and the total estimated area of the country is con- 

 siderably in excess of the facts. King considers 2 that there 

 were 310,000 small freeholders and farmers; a number which 

 would give a little less than sixty-eight acres of arable and 

 pasture to each family, or a little over twenty-nine acres arable. 

 The average of the fifty-five owners and occupiers in Tan- 



1 The labour bill on Lord Lovell's estate in 1732 is 714 4*. 9^. out of a 

 total expenditure (including a rent of 313 12*. gt/.) of uu 5*. aj^. ( the receipt! 

 being 1519 its. \od. 



1 King's calculation* are in Davenant, vol. U. pp. 175 iqq. 



VOL. V. 3G 



