04: 
JOURNAL OP THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
COUNTEY FAIRS AND EEVELS. 
BY MR. FAB YAN AMERY. 
(Read December 12th, 1878.) 
The last thirty years have witnessed a great development in the 
whole system of exchange of produce and manufactures in this 
country, which has necessitated and given rise to a correspondingly 
new and more expeditious mode of doing business than that by 
which our fathers used to buy and sell. 
It is not to be wondered at that this revolution should have 
materially altered the whole economy of our " country fairs," by 
disintegrating their compound structure, leaving in one only the 
trade factor, and in another the pleasure; but in every instance 
robbing them of their peculiar character, the result of this combin- 
ation of trade and pleasure. 
But the last ten years has almost completed this work of trans- 
formation ; for the measures rendered necessary to stamp out the 
"rinderpest" in 1866-7 closed nearly all the cattle fairs. Many 
have never since been restored, and all have been altered in 
character by the temporary break in the customs and usages of 
centuries. The present then is the time, before the last vestiges 
of the "Old English Country Fairs" disappear, to study their 
origin, development, history, and the influence they exerted on 
the habits and manners of the inhabitants of our rural districts. 
For the origin of fairs we must go back into the mists of 
antiquity ; and I believe we shall find the germs from which they 
have developed, in the remains of paganism allowed to become 
incorporated with Christianity by the early teachers of our faith. 
It seems certain that at special seasons of the year the Romanised 
British inhabitants of this country held feasts and rejoicings, in 
many cases similar to the greater Roman festivals. On the intro- 
duction of Christianity great difficulty was felt in weaning the 
