1 88 History of the English Landed Interest. 



to break up the virgin soil of the common sheepwalk. Amidst 

 the general lawlessness and disorder of the age, the Church 

 vassals were considered a privileged class and were seldom 

 molested, though their villages were fortified by occasional 

 towers whose overlapping battlements and advanced angles 

 became hastily manned by sharp-shooters in times of periL 

 Then, even if some daring intruder survived the heavy cross 

 fire of quarrels, the nail-studded oaken doors defied his severest 

 assault. Cottages thus fortified belonged to the principal 

 families of the township. They were miserable dwellings 

 at best, erected at the occupant's expense and paid for by some 

 yearly nominal rent, as an acknowledgment to the lord that 

 they were there on sufferance. Except the principal room, used 

 for every kind of house work, and called the " spence," there 

 was no place worthy of human habitation. A rough ladder led 

 to the sleeping compartment, which was a cramped space 

 jumbled up with the roof timbers. The inmates were con- 

 tented enough if but allowed to gather in unmolested their 

 turf and firewood from the outfield and their bread and ale 

 from the infield. These, together v;ith the salted meat of the 

 steer killed each November, an occasional pigeon pasty, a 

 capon now and then, a fish or two from the river, and a 

 cabbage out of the garden, sufficed to keep body and soul 

 together. Nor did they grudge their masters the venison 

 joints, the wafers, flamms, or pasty meats which they heard, 

 perhaps from their friend the abbey kitchener, were serv^ed 

 each day in the great oak panelled refectory. Much less did 

 they grudge or withhold the annual quit rent, which was paid 

 all the more cheerfully and regularly both because super- 

 stitious piety shrank from withholding the Church's dues, 

 and memory recalled many a kindly service emanating from 

 their reverend landlords' monastery.^ Compared with the 

 tenants of a lay barony, even setting aside their immunities 

 from military service and molestation, these Church-land 

 tenants had far the best of it. They had resident and indul- 

 gent landlords, whose education and calling would not allow of 



' Sir Walter Scott's Monastery contains a very faithful picture of wbat 

 has just been roughly painted in the foregoing pages. 



