A Sixteenth-Century Farm. 327 



circle. His neighbours in the common field watched him, for 

 they were each personally interested that he should not get 

 behindhand with his husbandry. His landlord's steward 

 watched him in order to detect any attempts to impoverish 

 the land, and his men not only watched him, but grumbled if 

 they thought he was negligent or wasteful of his opportunities. 

 No doubt also supervision was just as necessary to the farmer, 

 and labourers were just as liable to be idle or dishonest then 

 as now. The ideal of good farming, according to Barnaby 

 Googe, was wherever the ground was frequently manured 

 with the master's foot and the larder provendered with his 

 eye. Nor will the reader cavil at this old writer's sentiment, 

 since supervision not only deters or detects the bad workman, 

 but animates the good by its appreciation and approval. 



