The State Protection of Agriculture. 189 



when wheat husbandry predominated, and sheep were bred for 

 the butcher, what little identity of interests that had existed 

 between the husbandman and the trader was lost, and the 

 reason of the State for favouring the sheep, i.e. because its 

 wool was a chief item of commerce, was converted into that of 

 favouring it because its flesh was an important item of human 

 food. But in order to gain a comprehensive grasp of this 

 phenomenon, we must, at the risk of repeating what we have 

 already described, retrace our steps to earlier times, and 

 ascertain in what direction the farming economy of this 

 country was tending. 



The commercial element that had entered into possession of 

 the land during the Tudor period had devoted the bulk of its 

 energies to the production of wool, and therefore pasturage had 

 soon become a greater feature in English farming than tillage. 

 On the other hand, the large exportation of corn throughout 

 the first half of the eighteenth century would point to a dif- 

 ferent conclusion ; and it is only by a searching examination of 

 the statistics afforded by the national grain and wool markets, 

 and the legislation affecting English agriculture when traced 

 through several centuries, that we can reconcile these ap- 

 parently conflicting phenomena. 



During the fifteenth century the wool tod of 28 lbs. varied 

 from 8*'. to 5s. 4c?. From the middle to the end of the sixteenth 

 century it had increased to thrice that value, until in the reign 

 of Edward VI. it was selling at 20.s\^ The class of landowners 

 who succeeded the ecclesiastical landlord were not, as a rule, 

 overburdened with capital. They had none of that sympathy 

 engendered of traditional and mutual good offices, which bound 

 together the iuterests of feudal lord and villein. A strong 

 commercial instinct and a want of capital combined to induce 

 them to avoid the heavy labour bills and the sinking of capital 

 necessitated by corn husbandry ; and so they set to work to 

 abolish all the small farming establishments in their neigh- 

 bourhood, to enclose and lay down the common fields to grass, 

 and to drive out of the manor the superfluous labouring popu- 



' Rogers, Six Centuries of Work and Wages, chap. xvi. p. 444. 



