8laney on Rural Expenditure. 185 



two ; and setting the comparative dearness of cloth against the 

 cheapness of fuel, and many other articles, we may perhaps 

 consider any given sum under Henry III. and Edward I. 

 as equivalent, in general command over commodities, to about 

 twenty-four or twenty five-times that nominal value at present. 

 Under Henry VI. the coin had lost one third of its weight in 

 silver, which caused a proportional increase of money prices ; 

 but so far as I can perceive, there had been no diminution in 

 the value of the metal. By the statute 15 Hen. VI. c. 2. the 

 price up to which wheat might be exported is fixed at 6s. 8d. ; 

 a point, no doubt, above the average ; and the private docu- 

 ments of that period, which are sufficiently numerous, lead 

 to a similar result. Sixteen will be a fair multiple when we 

 would bring the general value of money in this reign to our 

 present standard. 



If the acts of parliament that regulate the wages in the 

 fourteenth and fifteenth centuries are considered with refer- 

 ence to the value of money at these periods, we shall gain 

 farther insight into the condition of the agricultural labourers 

 then. The statute of labourers in 1350 fixes the wages of 

 reapers during harvest at 3d. a day without diet, equal to 4s. 

 at present; that of the 23 Hen. VI. c. 12., in 1444, fixes 

 the reapers' wages at 5d., and those of common workmen 

 in building at 3%d, equal to 6s. 8d. and 4s. 8d. at present; that 

 of the 1 1 Hem 7. c. 22., in J 496, leaves the wages of labourers 

 at harvest as before, but rather increases those of ordinary 

 workmen. The yearly wages of a chief hind or shepherd, 

 by the act of 1444, were 1/. 4s. equal to about 20/.; those of 

 a common servant in husbandry 18s. 4<d., with meat and 

 drink. From a bailiff's account ofexpences in 1387, published 

 in the Archseologia, it appears that a ploughman had 6d. a 

 week, and 5s. a year, with an allowance of diet, which seems 

 to have been pottage. These wages are about equivalent to 

 15s. a week in present value. 



How seldom are the agricultural labourers of our times able 

 to purchase meat for dinner : this was not the case in the 

 middle of the fifteenth century. Sir John Fortescue, who 

 lived then, remarks, that the English lived far more upon an 

 animal diet, than their rivals the French ; and Harrison 

 informs us, that the Spaniards who came to England in 

 Queen Mary's days observed, " these English have their 

 houses made of sticks and dirt, but they fare commonly so 

 well as the King." 



We think we have offered a sufficient number of facts 

 to make out our first position regarding the condition of 

 the agricultural labourers, — that their wages at present give 



o 3 



