Crass I. Ol XM 
thro’ all its parts: this general fertility is owing to 
thofe clouded fkies, which foreigners miftakenly 
urge as a reproach on our country; but let us 
chearfully endure a temporary gloom, which 
cloaths not only our meadows but our hills with 
the richelt verdure. To this we owe the num- 
ber, variety, and excellence of our cattle, the rich- 
nefs of our dairies, and innumerable other advan- 
tages. Czar (the earlieft writer who defcribes this 
ifland of Great-Britain) {peaks of the numbers of 
our cattle, and adds that we neglected tillage, but 
lived on milk and flefh*. Strabo takes notice of our 
plenty of milk, but fays we were ignorant of the 
art of making cheefe-+. Me/a informs us, that 
the wealth of the Britains confifted in cattle: and 
in his account of Ireland reports that fuch was the 
richnefs of the paftures in that kingdom, that the 
cattle would even burft if they were fuffered to 
feed in them long at a time ft. 
This preference of pafturage to tillage was deli- 
vered down from our Britifh anceftors to much 
later times ; and continued equally prevalent du- 
ring the whole period of our feodal government : 
Lib. 6. ¢ Lib. 4. 
t Adeo luxuriofaherbis non letis modo fed etiam dulcibus, 
ut fe exigua parte diel pecora impleant, ut nifi pabulo pro- 
hibeantur, diutius pafta diffiliant. Lib. iii. c. 6. 
Hollinfoed {ays, (but we know not on what authority,) that 
the Romans preferred the Britifh cattle to thofe of Liguria. 
Defc. Br. 109. 
C2 the 
56 
