A HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX 



was occupied by cow-keepers, and to the east, by Bethnal Green and 

 Stepney, there was nursery ground again, chiefly devoted to the raising 

 of trees and plants. To the west, ' about a mile along the Kingsland 

 Road there are some 1,000 acres of valuable brick fields.' The reports 

 compute the number of acres in the county at 250,000, and of these 

 130,000 were meadow or pasture and 50,000 nursery gardens and 

 pleasure grounds. The land had greatly increased in value, and ' as is 

 natural in the neighbourhood of a large city ' was held in small portions 

 by a number of proprietors. Rents varied a good deal near London 

 under leases the land stood at about 50*. an acre, and inclosed garden 

 ground was worth from 5 to 8 an acre, and near Chelsea and Ken- 

 sington even to 10, and in the common fields near Fulham 3. 



The woods and copses of the county were nearly annihilated ; there 

 were still a few acres left on the northern slopes of Hampstead and 

 Highgate, and about 100 acres on the east side of Finchley Common, 

 1,000 in Enfield Chase, and 2,000 on the west side of Ruislip. The hills 

 about Copt Hall and Hornsey which were wood a few years before were 

 then meadow. 



Inclosure being, to the reporters of the Board of Agriculture, the 

 one saving grace of rural economy, the uninclosed condition of much of 

 the Middlesex arable appeared very unsatisfactory. ' It is hardly to be 

 credited 146 so near the metropolis, yet certain it is that there are still 

 many common fields in the county.' Middleton w? calculated that out of a 

 total arable acreage of 23,ooo, 148 20,000 acres were still in common fields, 

 and not producing sufficient wheat to supply one-fiftieth of the inhabi- 

 tants with bread. At Enfield, Edmonton, Tottenham, and Chiswick, 

 there were still meadows held by the old Lammas tenure. 149 In 1789 

 Stanwell inclosed 200 acres of its common fields, thereby increasing their 

 value almost immediately from 14.;. to 2OJ. the acre. 160 



Thirty acres were set apart and let at a rent of 2os. an acre and the 

 rent divided among those cottagers of the parish who did not pay above 

 5 a year rent and were not in receipt of public alms. 



The condition of the waste lands and commons was as unsatisfactory 

 to the reporters as that of the cultivated land. 



To the reproach of the inhabitants and to the utter astonishment of every 

 foreigner who visits us, the county contains many thousand acres, still in a state of 

 nature, though within a few miles of the capital, as little improved by the labour of 

 man, as if they belonged to the Cherolcees. 161 



By which neglect a yearly income of some thirty to fifty thousand 

 pounds is thrown away. Middleton 1M estimates the uncultivated soil at 

 1 7,000 acres, something like a tenth part of the entire acreage of the 

 county distributed among the following commons : 



Hounslow, Finchley (1,240 acres), the remains of Enfield Chase, 

 Harrow Weald and part of Bushey Heath (1,500 acres), besides eight 

 smaller commons in the parish of Harrow. Uxbridge Moor and 



l * Baird, Rep. m Midd. (1793). " r Agric. in Midd. (1798), 138. 



"* In 1827 Porter estimates the cultivated land of the county at 155,00030.; Progress of the 'Nation, 

 (1850,158. M Rep. to Ed. ofAgric. (1794). Iio Ibid. (1793). '" Ibid. (1795). '"Ibid. 



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