THE DUTCH INVASION 73 



farmers just at the time when it was likely to 

 have fullest effect. The feudal system, and the 

 cast-iron method of agriculture by which it was 

 accompanied, had already begun to break down. 

 The village, with its three fields and its three- 

 course rotation of wheat the first year ; beans, 

 peas, or other grain the second ; and fallow the 

 third, still prevailed, but rents were now usually 

 paid in money instead of in service and kind. 

 Landowners had become business men rather 

 than feudal chiefs, and, in consequence, much of 

 the land that had formerly been forest and waste 

 was parcelled out in large blocks to be farmed by 

 the landowners themselves or rented to farmers. 

 Fields were enclosed both for tillage and grazing, 

 and the economy of this system over the old 

 " mingle-mangle " of the village system, both as 

 regards crops and stock, was soon realised. 

 Formerly, no man could adopt new crops or a 

 new rotation, because his fellow-villagers and the 

 three-field system were both against it ; formerly, 

 no man could improve his stock unless the rest 

 of the villagers did the same, because the male 

 breeding animals were used in common, and the 

 female stock must all be grazed together. Now 

 the " champaign " farmer could grow the crops 

 that brought most profit, adopt an independent 

 rotation, and select and improve his live stock as 

 he had a mind. 



Thus, many British farmers were free to take 



