308 AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



To the names of Tull and Townshend should be added that of 

 Bakewell — the third member of the trinity of great men 

 whose names have been most closely associated with " the new 

 agriculture in England." Bakewell flourished at Dishley, in 

 Leicestershire, from 1760 to 1795, and produced the necessary 

 complement to good culture and fodder crops, namely, a breed 

 of mutton-producing sheep and a breed of beef-producing cattle. 



This " new agriculture " is of interest here because it led to 

 an increase in the size of farms, and to the inclosure of the 

 common fields, both of which movements had a marked influence 

 upon the status of the landowning farmers. In the agricultural 

 literature of the early part of the eighteenth century, one reads 

 of the great benefits to be derived from the inclosure of the 

 common-fields for the purpose of adopting the new agriculture ; 

 and these inclosures often involved the buying out of small 

 freeholders who held rights over the commons along with the 

 lords of the manors. Laurence, who wrote in 1727, taught with 

 emphasis that " A Steward should not forget to make the best 

 inquiry into the disposition of any of the freeholders within or 

 near any of his lord's manors to sell their lands, that he may use 

 his best endeavors to purchase them at as reasonable a price as 

 may be for his lord's advantage and convenience. Some instances 

 there have been of stewards, who, after they have made haste 

 to be rich, have made these inquiries for their own sakes, and 

 have purchased out the freeholders, thereby making an estate 

 for themselves, even within their own lord's manors ; insomuch 

 that sometimes I have known it so ordered that the lord's 

 tenants have been called to do suit and service at his own [the 

 steward's] court. But, for the sake of honor and honesty, I 

 hope these instances are rare ; and so I content myself to have 

 given this hint, still persuading the vigilant steward to be zealous, 

 for his lord's sake, in purchasing all the freeholders out as soon 

 as possible especially in manors where improvements are to be 

 made by inclosing commons and common-fields; which (as every 

 one, who is acquainted with the late improvement in agri- 

 culture, must know) is not a little advantageous to the nation 

 in general, as well as highly profitable to the Undertaker." 



