xiv Synopsis of Chapters. 



PAGE 



pedlar — The wheat-growing area of the period contrasted with 

 the demands of the population — Royal rights illusti-ated by re- 

 ference to the fair at "Westminster in Henry III.'s reign — 

 The staple and its effects on the wool trade — The importance of 

 Englisli wool and its large export trade — A short sketch of 

 mediaeval town economy — Its close connection with the Landed 

 Interests — The great centres of commerce — Seignorial rights 

 over fairs illustrated by a picture of the annual gathering at 

 Winchester — The Court of Piepoudre — The markets policed by 

 legislative enactments — Forestalling and regrating — Foreign 

 trade — The steel yard of the Hanse merchants — Its resemblance 

 to the feudal system, and a short history of its existence in 

 London 237 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



THE LAND BURDENS OF THE EUA. 



Effects of the sovereign's character on the rural populations — The 

 Rebellion of Wat the Tjder— Its causes, history, and termina- 

 tion — Preponderance of national taxation on land and labour 

 — Hidage and Danegeld replaced by scutage and carucage — 

 Political representation not necessarily a result of liability to 

 taxation — The tithe dues — The maintenance of the poor — The 

 various grades of poverty — Monastic poor relief funds — The 

 monks mere agents for the national relief funds, and conse- 

 quent national control over monastic endowments — Penal mea- 

 sures against citlpable poverty — The land twice charged for 

 the maintenance of the nation's pauper class — The effects of 

 the scarcity of rural labour on the letting of farms . . . 248 



Xlbe ITubor period* 



CHAPTER XIX. 



FURTHER LAND LEGISLATION EXAMINED. 



The Warsof.the Roses and the apathy of the lower classes — The at- 

 tractions of town life draw off rural labour — Seignorial mea- 

 sures to tie up landed property — The fiction of a common 

 recovery — Royal antagonism to a sj'stem of strict entail — The 

 Statute of Fines — Legislative measures against the protecting 

 effects of Uses — Results of the struggle leave the succession to 

 the land in much the same condition as before the Statt;te of 

 DeDonis — A more detailed description of the various measures — 

 A history of Fiction of Common Rccoverj'- — The three parties 

 to the collusion — A writ of formedon — The recovery deed — 

 The tenant to the praecipe — Ecclesiastical measures against the 

 Statutes of Mortmain^A Use — Details of — The Statutes of Fines 

 and Uses — Their causes and results — The Statute of Wills — The 

 reasons for the King's opposition to and the Lords' defence of 

 strict entails — A short history of the relationship between 

 sovereign, lord and people tliroughout this period — The politi- 

 cal results of the struggle on the national constitution fore- 

 shadowed, and the growth of popular independence demonstrated 

 — The agricultural changes afiect the character of the lower 

 classes 260 



