CONDEMNATION OF ENCLOSURES 63 



who make " one feaime of two or three," and even sometimes 

 " bringe VI to one " ; or of the greed of " step-lords," hke the 

 " rich frankhngs," ^ who 



" Occupyinge a dosen men's lyvyngis 

 Take all in their owne hondes alone." 



Nor do the innocent causes of much of the trouble escape attack ; 

 sheep " that were wont to be so myke and tame, and so smal eaters, 

 now, as I heare sale, be become so greate devowerers, and so wylde, 

 that they eate up and swallow down the very men themselfes," ^ 

 drive " husbandry " out of the country, and thrust " Christian 

 labourers " off the land. 



" Sheepe have eate up our medows and our downes, 

 Our come, our wood, whole villages and townes ; 

 Yea, they have eate up many wealthy men. 

 Besides widowes and orphane childeren ; 

 Besides our statutes and our Iron Lawes, 

 Which they have swallowed down into their maws : — 

 Till now I thought the proverbe did but jest. 

 Which said a blacke sheepe was a biting beast." ^ 



Enclosers were condemned by preachers as " guilty before God of 

 the sin in the text — ' they have sold the righteous for silver and the 

 poor for a pair of shoes.' " A playwright Hke Massinger did not 

 draw entirely on his imagination, but expressed the feeHng of the 

 day when he painted his portrait of a Sir Giles Overreach, insensible 

 to pity for his victims and justly called : 



" Extortioner, Tyrant, Cormorant, or Intruder 

 On my poor neighbour's right, or grand Incloser 

 Of what was common to my private use." * 



In the passion for sheep and hedges, which changed " merrie 

 England " into " sighing or sorrowful England," men saw the 

 fulfilment of the prophecy " Home and Thorne shall make England 

 forlorne." ^ Superstitions enforced the popular judgment, and 

 legend doomed " emparkers," hke Sir John Townley, to haunt the 

 solitudes they had created, uttering bitter cries of unavaiUng 

 remorse. 



1 " Rede me and be nott Wrothe." By WilHam Roy (1527), Arber's 

 Reprints, 28. 



2 More's Utopia, bk. i. (Ralph Robjmson's Translation), ed. Lupton, p. 51. 



3 Bastard's Chrestoleros (1598), bk. iv. Epigram 20. 

 * A New Way to pay Old Debts, Act. iv. Se. 1. 



^ Francis Trigge, Humble Petition of Two Sisters : tJie Church and the Com- 

 monwealth (1604). 



