2 28 History of the English Landed Interest. 



improvement. In the north of England vast tracts of common 

 lands prevailed, some of which were too mountainous to be 

 worth the expense of cultivating. In Northumberland, for 

 instance, though there were 450,000 acres returned as not 

 under tillage, there were only 120,000 of these capable of 

 being profitably employed in agriculture.^ In Cumberland'^ 

 there were 150,000 acres of improvable common, which the 

 writer of the Report terms sorrowfully " extensive tracts of 

 good corn land lying waste." 



Some of the sheep-breeding tracts of these counties, however, 

 though not capable of being ploughed, were considered more 

 profitable if enclosed. Thus the Northumbrian correspondent 

 argues as follows : " By separating dry ground from wet, the 

 stockmaster has it in his power to avoid that fatal malady, the 

 rot, and the sheep, freed from the whims of the shepherd and 

 the teasing of his dog, may be expected to feed with greater 

 facility." So also from Cumberland the report deplores the 

 disadvantages of the old economy, points out the prevalence of 

 rot, and declares that the commons are so over-stocked that 

 the sheep " barely exist." But on the more level plains the 

 reports are unanimous in praise, not only of enclosing, but of 

 ploughing the commons. 



In Durham the improvable wastes were estimated at 130,000 

 acres ; in Westmoreland the immense commons on the north 

 of Shap and around Crosby, Meaburn, Knoch, Newbiggin, etc., 

 were held to be improvable ; in Lancashire there were be- 

 tween 26,000 and 27,000 acres of marsh and fen and 482,000 of 

 moor and common — much of which was craggy, steep, and 

 unsuitable for ploughing, but many thousands of acres of 

 which would have paid for cultivation. In the North Riding 

 of Yorkshire there were 228,435 acres estimated to be capable 

 of some form of cultivation; in the "West Riding about one-sixth 

 of the whole area was redeemable waste ; and in the East 

 Riding, though there was very little of what could be termed 

 actually waste land, there were a great many commons which 

 were capable of yielding greater returns by means of drainage, 



^ General View of the Agriculture of Northumberland, pp. 7 and 51, 1794. 

 - General Vieiv of the Agriculture of Cumberland, p. 35. 



