146 HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE 



made by James I to encourage the growth of mulberry trees 

 and the breeding of silkworms, the lords-lieutenant of the 

 different counties being urged to see to it, but it had little 

 effect.^ 



The number of different sorts of wheat was by this time 

 considerable. Hartlib gives the white, red, bearded (* which 

 is not subject to mildews as others ') ; some sorts with two 

 rows, others with four and six ; some with one ear on a stalk, 

 others with two ; the red stalk wheat of Bucks ; winter wheat 

 and summer wheat. There were also twenty varieties of peas 

 that he knew, and the white, black, naked, Scotch, and Poland 

 oats. Markham adds the whole straw wheat, the great brown 

 pollard, the white pollard, the organ, the flaxen, and the chilter 

 wheat. 



There was a sad lack of enterprise in the breeding of stock 

 now and for many generations before ; indeed, it may be doubted 

 if this important branch of farming, except perhaps in the case 

 of sheep, was much attended to until the time of Bakewell 

 and the Collings. In Elizabeth's time a Frenchman had 

 twitted England with having only 3,000 or 4,000 horses worth 

 anything, which was one of the reasons that induced the 

 Spaniards to invade us.^ ' We are negligent, too, in our kine, 

 that we advance not the best species.' 



The size of cattle at this date, however, seems to have been 

 greater than is often stated. The Report of the Select Com- 

 mittee on the Cultivation of Waste Lands in 1795, states that 

 the average weight, dressed, of cattle at Smithfield in 1710 was 

 only 370 Ib.,^ yet the Household Book of Prince Henry at 

 the commencement of the seventeenth century says that an ox 

 should weigh 600 lb. the four quarters, and cost about £<) los., 

 a sheep about 45 lb., so that the latter were apparently 

 relatively smaller than the oxen. In 1603 oxen were sold at 



^ Compleat Husbandman, 1659, p. 57 ^ Ibid. p. Ti. 



' In this apparently repeating Davenant's statement. See M«CuIloch, 

 Commercial Dictionary, 1852, p. 271. 



