12 A ROYAL PURVEYANCE IN THE ELIZABETHAN AGE. 



stinted commons continual rights of pasture extended, directed by 

 a general law decided by and obligatory on the whole community. 

 The North Hampshire landholders were evidently corn farmers, 

 and in these returns we find a large preponderance of arable. 

 There were no means of transport, no passable roads, generally no 

 navigable rivers, no canals. Each district was necessarily self- 

 supporting, raised its own corn, fed its own hogs in the woods, 

 and made by women's labour its own warm clothing. The home 

 market was the only market. Landlords and farmers were content 

 to raise corn, because it paid as well if not better than anything 

 else. The government was contented, because the people were 

 employed and fed. But in this day it is not easy to picture to 

 ourselves, or even to imagine, the hardness and earnestness of the 

 life led by these simple North Hampshire folk in the 16th century. 

 A rude farmhouse mainly built in timber frames, plastered inside 

 and out with cob, locally called " wattle and dab," composed of 

 chalk malm and clay mixed with chopped straw, except on the 

 ceiling where hung the bacon rack, protected the family from 

 summer's heat and winter's cold. The house contained none of 

 the equipments which domestic economy now considers indispens- 

 able, none of the comforts and adornments which have now become 

 common necessities even in the humblest dwelling. The furniture 

 was of the simplest and crudest kind low benches with chests 

 under them running round the walls, while a rough oak " settle " 

 to keep off the piercing draughts of winter and an unwieldy table 

 formed the principal and movable items in the common living room. 

 A wide chimney bore from a broad hearth a large proportion of 

 the heat created by a lavish use of wood fuel. The farmer's joys 

 were simple, his pleasures few. At the same time, the rude home- 

 stead was an inclosed spot, sacred against all comers, the home 

 which came to be properly called an Englishman's castle, the first 

 step in the history of real property law. 



The position of these small proprietors or free-born yeomen, who 

 cultivated their forty, fifty, or eighty acres of land, is well repre- 

 sented in the following description of an English yeoman, by 

 Bishop Latimer, in a sermon preached before Edward VI. in 

 1549 : 



" My father was a yeoman, and had no land of his own ; only he had a farm 

 of three or four pound by the year at the uttermost ; and hereupon he 

 tilled so much as kept half-a-dozen men. He had walk for 100 sheep, 

 and my mother milked 30 kine. He was able and did find the King a 



