THE ENGLISH LAND SYSTEM 63 



from the latter date (1760) to 1867 there were above 

 four thousand inclosure Acts passed, and the quantity 

 of land so inclosed was no less than 7,325,439 acres. 

 Thus the total of the land inclosed from 17 10 to 1867 

 was 7,660,439 acres, or about one-third of the whole 

 of the land under cultivation in England and Wales 

 at the time of the Report (1867). 



This does not include large areas of land inclosed 

 without the sanction of Parliament — roadsides (so use- 

 ful to the cottager by giving food for his cow), commons, 

 pieces of commons, and other intakes. The usual 

 practice in such cases as these v/as to put up rail and 

 post or some other kind of fence. In very many cases 

 these fences Vy^ere pulled down in the night by the 

 people in the locality. They were put up again, and 

 perhaps pulled down a second time ; they were again 

 put up, and as a rule they permanently remained. 

 The usual notice, " Trespassers will be prosecuted," 

 then appeared, and the people's land became private 

 property. Any action at law was too costly for the 

 commoners to take ; but a case is recorded of a man 

 of wealth and influence who interfered to stop one of 

 these illesral inclosures and to save the common right 

 of the people. In 1866 the lord of the manor of 

 Berkhampstead inclosed a large part — 500 acres — of 

 the common land with more than a mile of iron 

 fencing. Mr. Augustus Smith (of the Scilly Isles) 

 happened to be a commoner in the parish, and he 

 took the side of the people. Assisted by a large body 

 of hired navvies, he pulled down the whole of the 

 fencing and laid it carefully on the ground. The lord 

 of the manor began an action for trespass against Mr. 

 Smith, who, however, defended the rights over the 

 common of himself and other commoners and of the 



