APPENDIX 165 



Davenant and King, who prepared agricultural and other 

 statistics in the closing years of the XVIIth century, thought 

 that 55 per cent, of England and Wales was under cultivation. 

 The amount of land cultivated in Wales must have been very 

 small. We may therefore guess that out of the 32^ million 

 acres in England, some 19 million was either arable or meadow 

 or pasture, whether common or enclosed. Of the area under 

 cultivation authorities seem agreed in thinking that some two- 

 fifths would be enclosed perhaps 8 million acres. 



Judging from Professor Caird's estimate made in the middle 

 of the XlXth century, the largest area of land brought under 

 cultivation in England was about 27 million acres. The amount 

 is now, of course, much less. If we accept these figures, it will 

 follow that about 19 million acres, 30 thousand square miles, has 

 been definitely enclosed and fenced in since the later years of 

 the XVIIth century. Of these 19 million acres, about a third 

 (6 million more or less), was enclosed by Act of Parliament. The 

 remaining two-thirds have been enclosed by other means, i.e. 

 by agreement, by appropriation, by the action of lords of manors 

 who bought up all the tenants, or in some cases after reclamation 

 of ownerless fen, moor and other waste land. 



The greater part of the work of enclosure went on before the 

 middle of the XlXth century. But ever since then there has 

 undoubtedly been a considerable amount of appropriation of 

 land by lords of the manors and others, and also a few statutory 

 enclosures. 



There is still in England, a survival of the old condition, a 

 large area, perhaps 7 or 8 million acres, which retains its old 

 character of waste, woodland, moor or fen. There are also a 

 considerable number of old commons and some manorial 

 woods, subject to pasturage and woodcutting and other similar 

 rights. A few areas of arable land that have never been en- 

 closed are still to be found : the principal examples are in the 

 parishes of Clothall, Bygrave and Wallington in Hertfordshire, 

 at Soham in Cambridgeshire, and at Laxton in Nottinghamshire. 

 There are also lot meadows at Yarnton in Oxfordshire and 

 doubtless elsewhere. It may be interesting to the student to 

 learn that a few new commons have been created under the 

 provisions of the Small Holdings Acts. 



