CHAPTER III. 



" And in the gardin at the sonne uprist 

 She walketh up and down wher as hire Hst 

 She gathereth floures, party whyte and reede 

 To make a sotil gerland for hire heede." 



Chaucer, Knighfs Tale. 



t~^ REAT changes were taking place in England during the 



^^^ latter half of the fourteenth, and beginning of the following 



century. Trades and industries increased, and in like manner 



horticulture revived. During the years which had passed since 



the Norman Conquest, the conquerors and conquered had 



become welded into one nation, and this had not been effected 



peacefully. But we now come to a period when the battles 



were being fought on foreign soil, while the nation was enjoying 



comparative peace at home. In the country itself, the poorer 



sections of the community were gradually asserting their rights 



against the lords of the soil. There was a class growing up, 



of farmers who farmed lands, merely paying some yearly tribute 



in service, or in kind, to their overlord. Round these small 



farms and manors, gardens and orchards were planted, and 



thus it can be seen how such movements would affect the 



progress of gardening. 



From incidental references in writings of the time it appears 



that the poorer classes chiefly lived on vegetables, as the following 



quotations from Langland serve to show : 



" Alle the pore peple pesecoddes fetten * 

 Benes and baken apples thei brou3te in her lappes 

 Chibolles and cheruelles and ripe chiries manye." f 



Again, he says, the poor folk 



" With grene poret and pesen to povsonn hunger thei thought." % 



* Fetch. f Piers Ploughman , % Ibid. 



