8 Domesday and Feudal Statistics 



that is exactly what is not suggested, and which, 

 I believe, can be demonstrated did not occur. 

 Should any practical agriculturist honour my 

 pages by his perusal, he must bear in mind 

 there are who believe that not 120 acres, but 

 even 180, of arable were tilled in one year by 

 one plough ; certain it is he will be as little 

 able to credit such unheard of practices in his 

 art as the real existence of the dragons etc., 

 of our monastic chroniclers. Whilst those ab- 

 stracted from terrestrial affairs may conceive such 

 astounding husbandry, he can never have been so 

 fortunate as to have seen or heard of it (saving 

 steam-ploughing) in any ordinary tillage routine 

 of this country, nor will he allow the speculations 

 of scholars the colour of superior knowledge. For 

 what of credence would be given to the mathe- 

 matician who persistently found a product of five 

 from the addition of two and two, or to the 

 classical instructor who rendered tenet and valet 

 as tenuit and valuit ; just so when writers on 

 matters rural inform their readers of the non- 

 existence of the mediaeval harrow, or gravely 

 repeat that in ploughing an acre three miles 

 (two leucas) are traversed, or that from % to 

 all T acre could be ploughed before mid-day.* 



* But the profundity of the erudite mind is best discovered 



in a statement of the Regius Professor of Modern History at 



Oxford Oxford (p. 123, "Social England," vol. i.), where for every 



arithmetic. p erc h of" i6J feet," for a furrow of "eleven inches broad," 



the " plow " is made to traverse the distance in " 4 or 4^ " 



rounds : with such a furrow of course 22 inches would be 



done per round, making just 9 journeys to and fro. It is to 



be hoped that the promoters of the Agricultural Education 



