3/2 Dr. Parry's Essay on the Nature, Produce, Origin, 



In the year 1534, the 26th of Henry VIII, the profit arising from sheep, corU' 

 paratively with other modes of applying land, was become so great, that varioiis 

 individuals possessed from 5000 to 24,000 each; in consequence of which, Par- 

 liament, attributing thereto the dearness not only of corn, but of sheep and wool, 

 enacts, that no one shall keep, at any one time, more than 2400 sheep, exclusively 

 of lambs, except on his own lands of inheritance, and except spiritual persons; in 

 both which cases there is no limitation* 



It is said by Rapin and others, that in the year 1551, the 5th of Edward VI. 

 44,000 woollen cloths were exported from England by the merchants of the Still- 

 yard only ; and, probably, a much greater number by other persons. 



The reputation of England for its native wool was now approaching its greatest 

 height. We are informed by Lodovico Guicciardini, who wrote the history of the 

 Low Countries in 1560, that, at this time, there were annually exported from 

 England to Bruges, then the staple of the commodities of this island, 1200 serpillieres 

 of wool of various sorts and prices, amounting, on the whole, to at least 250,000 

 crowns per annum. t Having not been able to procure the original Italian, I quote 

 from the French published by Plantinus, at Antwerp, in 1581, under the immediate 

 direction of the author, and revised and augmented by him. The word Serpilliere 

 does not mean a sack of 364 lb. as is usually supposed ; but the Sarplarium of our 

 ancient records, called in English a Sarple, or Surple. In Rymer's Foedera, among 

 the seizures of wool in the various counties of England in the year 1341, the 15th of 

 Edward III. for the ransom of Henry of Lancaster, Earl of Derby, then a prisoner, 

 we find it directed that, in the county of Leicester, a seizure should be made "de 

 " triginta quatuor Sarplar. tribus Saccis, et viginti duobus Petris;" J thirty-four 

 sarples, three sacks, and twenty-four stones. These are different denominations of 

 quantities, the whole of the third of which must be less than one of the second, and 

 the whole of the second less than one of the first. So if we should say thirty-four 

 hundred, three quarters, and twenty-seven pounds, we shew that more than twenty- 

 seven pounds are contained in one quarter, and more than three quarters in one 

 hundred. By the same rule, a sarple must have been, at least, four sacks; and the 



■* Anderson, 1514. This law is still in force. Burn's Justice. Great and enviable were the 

 privileges of those higher orders in the early periods of our history. In tiie zzd year of King 

 Edward IV. Parliament graciously accords them the exclusive right nates et genitalia detegendi. 



f Description de tous Ics Pais Bas, page 195. X Foedera, V. 248. 



