V 



8o THE ENCLOSURES IN ENGLAND [236 



abandonment is more clearly indicated by another survey of 

 this series, that of Eggleston. . . . Presumably the fields had 

 once been largely arable. When, however, the survey was 

 made, change had begun, though not in the direction of en- 

 closure, of which there was still little. Conversion to meadow 

 had proceeded without it : nearly all the parcels of the various 

 tenants in East field and West field are said to have been 

 meadow; arable still predominated only in Middle field, and 

 even there it had begun to yield.^ 



At Westwick, Whorlton, Bolam and Willington in Durham, 

 and at Wei ford, Northamptonshire, a similar transforma- 

 tion had taken place. ^ 



This land was obviously withdrawn from cultivation not 

 because the tenants preferred grass land, or because grass 

 land was more valuable than arable, but because it could be 

 plowed only at a loss. Where, as at Greens Norton, arable 

 and leas are valued separately in the survey, the grass land 

 is shown to be of less value than the land still under cultiva- 

 tion.' The land craved rest, (to use Tusser's phrase), and 

 and the grass which grew on it was of but little value. 

 Here we have no capitalist systematically buying up land 

 for grazing, b ut a with drawal of land froni cultivation bv 

 the tenants themselves, even though they were in no position 

 tO:j)repare it properly for grazing purposes. The impor- 

 tance of this fact cannot be over-emphasized. It is trud 

 that pasture, properly enclosed and stocked, was profitable, 

 and that men who were able to carry out this process became 

 notorious among their contemporaries on account of their 

 gains. But it is also true that the land which was converted' 

 to pasture by these enclosers was fit for nothing else. Hus- 

 bandmen had had to withdraw much of their open-field 



^Gray, op. cit., pp. 106-107. 



2 Gray, op. cit., pp. 35, 106-107. 



' Lennard, Rural Northamptonshire, pp. loo-ioi. 



