105 



practical progress was once more suspended by the social changes 

 and political uncertainties of the last half of the seventeenth century. 

 Agriculture languished, if it did not actually decline. It is a 

 significant fact that between 1640 and 1670 not more than six 

 patents were taken out for agricultural improvements. Country 

 gentlemen ceased to interest themselves hi farming pursuits. " Our 

 gentry," notes Pepys, " are grown ignorant in everything of good 

 husbandry." Without their initiative progress was almost im- 

 possible. Open-field farmers could not change their field-customs 

 without the consent of the whole body of partners. Farmers in 

 individual occupation of their holdings had not, as a general rule, 

 the enterprise, the education, the capital, or the security of tenure, 

 to conduct experiments or adopt improvements. 



But the period was one of active preparation. A crowd of 

 agricultural writers followed in the train of Fitzherbert, Tusser, 

 and Googe. Leonard Mascall in his Booke of Cattell (1591) had 

 instructed husbandmen in the more skilful " government " of 

 horses, oxen, cattle, and sheep. Gervase Markham wrote on every 

 variety of agricultural subjects, multiplying his treatises under 

 different titles with a rapidity which gained for him the distinction 

 of being the " first English hackwriter," and proved that books on 

 farming found a sale. 1 Horses were made the subject of special 

 treatment. Blundeville's Power chiefyst offices belonging to Horse- 

 manshippe (1565-6) was followed by such books as Markham's 

 Discourse on Horsemanshippe (1593) and How to Chuse, Ride, Trayne, 



1 As an agricultural writer, Markham's reputation was doubtful, in spite 

 of the many editions which were published of his works. In Hartlib's Legacie 

 (1651) B. Child in his " Large Letter " had spoken of the want of a complete 

 book on English husbandry. On this a critic had remarked " England hath a 

 perfect systeme of Husbandry, viz. Markham." The author replies (Legacie, 

 3rd edition, 1655) : " He speaketh more of Markham than ever I heard 

 before, or as yet have seen. In general he is accounted little more than a 

 Translator, unless about Cattle, and yet I cannot but in that question his 

 skill. . . . The works which I have seen of his are, first, the great book 

 translated out of French " (The Country Farm, 1616, a revision of Surflet's 

 translation of the Maison Rustique, with additions from foreign writers), 

 " which whether well or ill done, I will not declare ; but I am sure our Hus- 

 bandmen in England profit little by it. Secondly I have seen five several 

 bookes bound up together, two or three of which he acknowledgeth to be 

 anothers, as The Improvement of the Wild oj Kent, also his Houswifery he 

 acknowledgeth to have had from a Countess, also part of his Farewell is 

 borrowed, and what he owneth, if I have seen all, are very short in many 

 particulars. . . . Yea, if I understand any thing, he setteth down many 

 gross untruths, which every Countryman will contradict." He quotes 

 instances, and concludes " he hath done well in divers things, and is to be 

 commended for his industry." 



