FAEMING FOE PEOFIT 21 



pasture. The change was at first advantageous to all 

 the classes concerned. Wage-earning labourers obtained 

 more constant employment, while more substantial farmers 

 reaped advantages from the consolidation of their hold- 

 ings. Such enclosures were warmly recommended by 

 practical agi'iculturists like Fitzherbert, who advises every 

 man to ' change fields with his neighbour, so that he may 

 lay his lands together,' keep more cattle, improve the soil 

 by their ' compostynge,' and rest his corn land when it 

 becomes impoverished. A new conception of agriculture 

 dawned on men's minds. Landlords recognised that the 

 soil might produce rents now that they had ceased to 

 need retainers ; farmers were no longer content to produce 

 enough for their own families, but desired to become 

 growers as well as consumers. It is significant that the 

 earliest corn laws were passed in the reign of Henry VI. 

 Legislation to maintain the value of corn begins in 1436, 

 and in 1463 foreign imports were forbidden^ until prices 

 reached the point at which export was prohibited. 



But it was not long before commercial interests gave a 

 new direction to agricultural tendencies, which proved fatal 

 to the lower ranks of the labouring or land-holding popu- 

 lation. The wars of the Roses were the suicide of feudal- 

 ism, and in the reign of Edward IV. the spirit of trade 

 breathed freely throughout England. If farmers were 

 slow to recognise that ' the foot of the sheep turns sand 

 into gold,' merchants were quick to see that money might 

 be made by the growth of wool. But sheep could not be 

 herded with success upon commons, and small holdings 

 were incompatible with large flocks. 



' No corn was to be imported until wheat was 6^. Sd., rye 4s., barley 

 3s. the quarter. These prices must have been high. (See table of 

 prices of wheat, Appendix I.) 



