Introduction. xxi 



bring us to 1531, which is not inconsistent with his statement, 

 if such be the date of the copy above mentioned. If, how- 

 ever, it should appear that the statement exists even in the 

 first edition printed in 1523, then the "forty years" would 

 lead us to suppose that, if the assigned date of his birth be 

 correct, Sir Anthony began to be a householder, in his own 

 estimation, at the early age of twelve or thirteen. This is 

 of course a difiSculty, but not an insuperable one, for the 

 phrase " have been a householder" is somewhat vague, and 

 the phrase " forty years or more " has rather the air of a 

 rhetorical flourish. 



It may here be noticed that Berthelet's first edition (here 

 reprinted) has nothing on the title-page but the words " THE 

 BOKE OF HVSBANDRY," with the date 1534 below. Later 

 reprints which follow Berthelet have accordingly no statement 

 as to the book being " newly corrected and amended by the 

 auctour," etc. ; whilst those which follow Treuerys naturally 

 copy it. This accounts for the fact that the later editions are, 

 to the best of my belief, all very much the same, and that the 

 claim to possess " corrections and amendments " means prac- 

 tically nothing, except with reference to \}cv'& first edition only. 



Of Sir Anthony Fitzherbert, one of the best accounts 

 seems to be that given in the Biographia Britannica, 1750, 

 vol. iii. p. 1935, where Camden's statement as to his being 

 " Chief Justice " is refuted. Briefly recapitulated, this account 

 tells us that he was born in 1470, and was the younger son of 

 Ralph Fitzherbert, Esq., of Norbury in Derbyshire ; that he 

 went to Oxford, and thence to the Inns of Court ; was made 

 a serjeant-at-law, Nov. 18, 151 1; was knighted in 15 16; was 

 made one of his majesty's serjeants-at-law, and finally one of 

 the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas in 1523. He died 

 May 27, 1538, and was buried at Norbury. "Two things are 

 mentioned in reference to his conduct ; first, that, without fear 



