102 LAND REFORM 



houses swept away, every institution which Catholic 

 piety had bequeathed for the support of the poor was 

 either abolished or suspended till it could be organized 

 anew. The poor, smarting with rage and suffering", 

 and seeing piety and honesty trampled under foot by 

 their superiors, were sinking into savages."^ 



The old feudal aristocracy, oppressors of the hus- 

 bandmen as they were, had some regard for those 

 rights of the cultivators which were founded on custom 

 law and tradition, but the new aristocracy had none. 

 " Inorrossinor" and inclosure and other forms of con- 

 fiscation were carried out with vigour. Some of the 

 unfortunates who were thus dispossessed of their hold- 

 ings — uprooted from the soil — entered into trade and 

 other callings, others sunk into the position of hirelings, 

 but most of them, rendered houseless and landless, 

 went to swell the ranks of the vagabond class. 



To these must be added the vast number of persons 

 belonging to the religious houses, who, with their de- 

 pendents, were cast adrift. Altogether, this social 

 revolution resulted in such widespread misery and 

 destitution as can hardly be estimated. The process 

 of turning public lands into private property was the 

 direct cause of the great rebellions of 1549 under Kett 

 and other leaders. Further, it created a multitude of 

 beggars, rogues, and vagabonds, which governments 

 tried in vain to put down by the gallows and other 

 severe punishments, and which, in a later reign, had 

 to be dealt with by the establishment of our poor-law 

 system, and the creation for the first time in England 

 of a class of legal paupers.^ 



» "History of England," Vol. V, p. 273. 



- The rebellions under Kett and others will be referred to in a later 

 chapter. 



