400 CASTLE MORTON 



end of the parish, bordering the common. It had 

 been taken over in a very foul condition, and much 

 of it is poor, stony land. It is taken on a twenty- 

 one years' lease from Lady Henry Somerset at a 

 rental of 12s. an acre. The Parish Council pay all 

 rates, and let the land at rents varying from 12s. to 

 28s., according to the situation and quality. They 

 have always a working balance of 5 to 20 in 

 hand. The men pay up very well. They are 

 fined Is. if the rent is not paid on the audit day, 

 and there is a rule, which there has been no occasion 

 to enforce, that the land will be forfeited by fourteen 

 days' arrears. 



On this land there is a good piece of meadow, 

 which is let out in five 3-acre lots at 28s. an acre, 

 the Parish Council doing the fencing. Pieces of 

 tillage on much poorer land have been laid down 

 to pasture by the men themselves, and held at 

 rents varying from 12s. to 18s. In these cases 

 the men put up their own post-and-wire fencing, 

 and one or two have erected sheds. 



A 30-acre tillage field is let out in 1 and 2 acre 

 lots. Most of the men hold more than one such 

 lot, besides the 3 acres of pasture mentioned above ; 

 in fact, eighteen or twenty individual tenants hold 

 as much as 5 and 6 acres. The arable lots are all 

 cultivated in much the same way. Wheat and 

 beans, for home consumption and pig-feeding, appear 

 to be the prevailing crops ; there are also potatoes, 

 peas, rye grass and clover, and vetches. A second 

 field of tillage is let out in 1-acre lots at 16s. an 

 acre. 



As one often hears it stated that the small men 



