44 



HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part I. 



for they w ill not only eat the greens, but feed on the roots in tlie ground, and scoop them 



hollow even to the ver>' skin Ten acres," he adds, " sown widi clover, turnips, &c, 



\nll feed as many sheep as one hundred acres thereof would before have done." (Howh- 

 t Oil's CoUecHoJis, vol. i v. p. 142 144.) 



238. Potatoes, first introduced in 1565 (230.), were at this time beginning to attract 

 notice. " The potato, " says Houghton, " is a bacciferous herb, with esculent roots, 



bearing winged leaves, and a bell flower This, 1 have been informed, was brought 



first out of Virginia by Sir Walter Raleigh ; 

 and he stopping at Ireland, some was 

 planted there, where it thrived very well, 

 and to good purpose ; for in their succeed- 

 ing wars, when all the com above ground 

 was destroyed, this supported them ; for 

 the soldiers, unless they had dug up all the 

 ground where they grew, and almost sifted 

 it, could not extirpate them. From thence 

 they were brought to Lancashire, where 

 they are very numerous, and now they be- 

 gan to spread all the kingdom over. They 

 are a pleasant food, boiled or roasted, and 

 eaten with butter and sugar. There is a 

 sort brought from Spain that are of a longer 

 form (Convolvulus ^a/a/as) (Jig. 30.), and 

 are more luscious than ours ; tliey are much 

 set by, and sold for sixpence or eightpence the pound." (lb., vol. ii. p. 468.) 



239. Embankments were made on the eastward of England, in various places, by the 

 Romans, when in possession of the country, and afterwards by some wealthy religious 

 houses, and by the government. Considerable exertions were made at Boston during the 

 reign of Henry VII., under the direction of Mayhave Hake, a Flemish engineer, and 

 fourteen masons ; but the principal effort, as far as respects gaining land for agricultural 

 purposes, was made during tlie protectorate, by Col. Vermuyden, a Fleming, who 

 served in Cromwell's army. Speaking of this engineer's exertions, Harte obsenes, " if my 

 account stands right (and it comes from the best authority extant), our kingdom in the 

 space of a few years, till the year 1651 only, had recovered, or was on the point of 

 recovering, in Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, and Kent, 425,000 acres 

 of fens and morasses, which were advanced in general, from half a crown an acre to 

 twenty and thirty shillings. So that, perhaps, few statesmen and generals have better 

 deserved a statue or momunent from this country than Vermuyden, the principal un- 

 dertaker." 



240. The exportation of com was regulated by various laws, during the sixteenth cen- 

 tury ; and importation was not restrained even in plenty and cheapness. In 1 663 was 

 passed the first statute for levying tolls at turnpikes. Enclosures by consent and by act 

 of parliament began also to be made during this century. 



241. The agriculture of Scotland during the Jifteenth and sixteenth centuries continued 

 to languish, especially upon the estates of the barons, where the profession of a soldier 

 was regarded as of greater importance than that of a cultivator of the ground ; but the 

 ecclesiastical lands were considerably improved, and the tenants of them were generally 

 much more comfortably circxmistanced than those upon the estates of laymen. The 

 reformation of religion, beneficial as it was in other respects, rather checked than pro- 

 moted agricultiiral improvement ; because the change of property, which then occurred, 

 occasioned a similar change of tenantry, and almost took husbandrj- out of the hands of the 

 monks, the only class of people by whom it was practised upon correct principles. The 

 dissolution of the monasteries and other religious houses was also attended with injurious 

 consequences in the first instance ; though latterly the greatest benefit has been derived 

 from tithes and church lands having come into the hands of laymen. It is probable, had 

 not these circumstances occurred, that the tithe system would have still remained in force, 

 and Scottish husbandry have continued under a burthen, which sinks and oppresses the 

 cultivator of England and Ireland. But tithes having got into the hands of lay titulars, 

 or impropriators, were in general collected or farmed with such severity as to occasion the 

 most grievous complaints, not only from the tenantry, but also from the numerous class 

 of proprietors, who had not been so fortunate as to procure a share of the general spoil. 

 This, added to the desire shown by the crown to resume the grants made when its power 

 was comparatively feeble, occasioned the celebrated submission to Charles I., which ended 

 in a settlement, that in modem times has proved highly beneficial, not only to the interest 

 of proprietors, but likewise to general improvement. Tithes, in fact, are a burthen, 

 which op>erate as a tax upon industry, though it was a long time before the beneficial 

 consequences of withdrawing them were fully understood. (Edin. Encyc, art. Agr.) 



