HOP-GROWING ppsx

8d., one acre of ground and the third part of one man's labour with small cost beside, shall yield unto him that ordereth the same well, fortie marks yearly and that for ever,' an optim

HOP-GROWING

PROGRESS AT LAST.—HOP-GROWING.—PROGRESS OF

ENCLOSURE.—HARRISON'S 'DESCRIPTION'

The period we have now reached was one of steady growth in the value of land and

its products In 1543 Henry VIII, who had given away or squandered, in addition to

the great treasure left him by his thrifty father, all the wealth obtained from the

dissolution of the monasteries, debased the coinage in order to get more money

into his insatiable hands, and prices went up in consequence But there were other

causes: the influx of precious metals from newly discovered America into Europe

had commenced to make itself felt, and the population of the country began to

grow steadily Also, it must not be forgotten that the seasons, which in the early

part of the century had been normal, were for the next sixty years frequently rainy

and bad It is unnecessary to say that this must have largely helped to raise the

price of corn The average price of wheat from 1540-1583 was 13s 101/2d a

quarter; from 1583-1702, 39s 01/2d.Corn was still subject to extraordinary

fluctuations: in 1557, Holinshed says before harvest wheat was 53s 4d a quarter,

malt 44s After harvest wheat was 5s., malt 6s 8d., the former prices being due to a

terrible drought in England Oxen in the period 1583-1703 were worth 75s.instead

of under £1 in the period 1400-1540 Wool was from 9d to 1s a lb instead of

about 31/2d., and all other farm products increased with these.[215]

Hops were from

1540-1582 about 26s 8d a cwt., and from 1583-1700, 82s 91/2d In 1574 Reynold

Scott published the first English treatise on hops,[216]

in which he says, 'one man

may well keep 2,000 hils, upon every hil well ordered you shall have 3 lb of

hoppes at the least, one hundred pounds of these hoppes are commonly worth

26s 8d., one acre of ground and the third part of one man's labour with small cost

beside, shall yield unto him that ordereth the same well, fortie marks yearly and

that for ever,' an optimistic estimate that many growers to-day would like to see

realized 'In the preparation of a hop garden', says the same writer, 'if your ground

be grasse, it should be first sowen with hempe or beanes which maketh the ground

melowe, destroyeth weedes, and leaveth the same in good season for this

purpose.[217]

At the end of Marche, repayre to some good garden to compound with

the owner for choice rootes, which in some places will cost 5d an hundredth And

now you must choose the biggest rootes you can find, such as are three or four

inches about, and let every root be nine or ten inches long, and contain three joints.'

Holes were then to be dug at least 8 feet apart, one foot square, and one foot deep,

and in each two or three roots planted and well hilled up Tusser, however,

recommended them much closer:

'Five foot from another each hillock should stand,As straight as a levelled line with

the hand.Let every hillock be four foot wide.Three poles to a hillock, I pas not how

long,Shall yield the more profit set deeplie and strong.'

Three or four poles were to be set to each hill 15 or 16 feet long, unless the ground

was very rich, the poles 9 or 10 inches in circumference at the butt, so as to last

longer and stand the wind well After they were put up, the ground round the poles

was to be well rammed Rushes or grass were used for tieing the hops During the

growth of the hops, not more than two or three bines were to be allowed to each

pole; and after the first year the hills were to be gradually raised from the alleys

between the rows until, according to the illustrations in Scott's book, they were 3 or

4 feet high, the 'greater you make your hylles the more hoppes you shall have upon

your poals' When the time for picking came, the bines when cut were carried to a

'floore prepared for the purpose', apparently of hardened earth, where they were

stripped into baskets, and Scott thought that 'it is not hurtfull greatly though the

smaller leaves be mingled with the hoppes' In wet weather the hops were to be

stripped in the house The fire for drying hops was of wood, and some dried their

hops in the sun, both processes to us appearing very risky; as the first would be too

quick, and the latter next to impossible in September in England They were

sometimes packed in barrels, as Tusser tells us, 'Some close them up drie in a

hogshead or vat, yet canvas or sontage (coarse cloth) is better than that.'

By this time England had largely changed from a corn-growing to a stock-raising

country; Harrison, writing in the middle of Queen Elizabeth's reign, says, 'the soile

of Britaine is more inclined to feeding and grazing than profitable for tillage and

bearing of corne and such store is there of cattle in everie place that the fourth

part of the land is scarcely manured for the provision of graine.' But this statement

seems exaggerated We know that by Harrison's time enclosures had affected but a

small area, and the greater part of the cultivated land was in open arable fields The

yield of corn was now much greater than in the Middle Ages; rye or wheat well

tilled and dressed now produced 15 to 20 bushels to the acre instead of 6 or 8,

barley 36 bushels, oats 4 or 5 quarters[218]

, though in the north, which was still

greatly behind the rest of England, crops were smaller No doubt this was partly

due to the much-abused enclosures: the industrious farmer could now do what he

liked with his own, without hindrance from his lazy or unskilful neighbour

Tusser's preference for the 'several' field is very decided; comparing it with the

'champion' or common field he says:—

The countrie inclosed I praisethe tother delighteth me not,There swineherd that

keepeth the hogthere neetherd with cur and his horne,There shepherd with whistle

and dogbe fence to the medowe and corne,There horse being tide on a balkeis

readie with theefe for to walke,Where all things in common doth restecorne field

with the pasture and meade,Tho' common ye do for the bestyet what doth it stand

ye in steade?More plentie of mutton and beefecorne butter and cheese of the

bestMore wealth any where (to be briefe)more people, more handsome and prest

(neat.)Where find ye? (go search any coaste)than there where enclosure is

most.More work for the labouring manas well in the towne as the fielde.For

commons these commoners crieinclosing they may not abide,Yet some be not able

to biea cow with her calf by her side.Nor laie (intend) not to live by their

wurke,But thievishly loiter and lurke.What footpaths are made and how

brodeAnnoiance too much to be borne,With horse and with cattle what rodeis

made thorowe erie man's come

But the rich graziers boasted that they did not grow corn because they could buy it

cheaper in the market; and they are said to have traded on the necessity of the

poor farmer to sell at Michaelmas in order to pay his rent, and when they had got

the corn into their hands they raised the price The corn-dealers of the time were

looked upon with dislike by every one; many of the dearths then so frequent, and

nearly always caused by bad seasons, were ascribed to 'engrossers buying of corn

and witholding it for sale' By a statute of 1552 the freedom of internal corn trade

was entirely suppressed, and no one could carry corn from one part of England to

another without a licence, and any one who bought corn to sell it again was liable

to two months' imprisonment and forfeited his corn Although we shall see that this

policy was reversed in the next century, the feeling against corn-dealers survived

for many years and was loudly expressed during the Napoleonic war; indeed, we

may doubt if it is extinct to-day

Many of the fruits and garden produce, which had been neglected since the first

Edward, had by now come into use again, 'not onlie among the poor commons, I

meane of melons, pompions, gourds, cucumbers, radishes, skirets (probably a sort

of carrot), parsneps, carrots, cabbages, navewes (turnip radishes (?)),

turnips,[219]

and all kinds of salad herbes, but also at the tables of delicate

merchants, gentlemen, and the nobilitie.'[220]

'Also we have most delicate apples, plummes, pears, walnuts, filberts, &c., and

those of sundrie sorts, planted within fortie years past, in comparison of which

most of the old trees are nothing worth: so have we no less store of strange fruite,

as abricotes, almonds, peaches, figges, cornetrees (probably cornels) in noblemen's

orchards I have seen capers, orenges, and lemmons, and heard of wild olives

growing here, besides other strange trees.'[221]

As a proof of the growth of grass in proportion to tillage between the fourteenth

and sixteenth centuries, Eden gives several examples,[222]

of which the following are

'Our sheepe are very excellent for sweetness of flesh, and our woolles are preferred

before those of Milesia and other places.'[223]

So thought Harrison and many English

landowners and farmers too, so that legislation was powerless to stop the spread of

sheep farming In 1517 a commission of inquiry instigated by Wolsey held

inquisition on enclosures and the decay of tillage, and it seems to have been the

only honest effort to stop the evil It was to inquire what decays, conversions, and

park enclosures had been made since 1489, but the result even of this attempt was

small In 1535 a fresh statute, 27 Hen VIII, c 22, stated that the Act limiting the

number of sheep to be kept had only been observed on lands held of the king,

whereon many houses had been rebuilt and much pasture reconverted to tillage;

but on lands holden of other lords this was not the case, therefore the king was to

have the moiety of the profits of such lands as had been converted from tillage to

pasture since 4 Hen VII until a proper house was built and the land returned to

tillage; but the Act only applied to fourteen counties therein enumerated The

enclosing for sheep-runs still went on, however, often with ruthless selfishness;

houses and townships were levelled, says Sir Thomas More, and nothing left

standing except the church, which was turned into a sheep-house:

'The towns go down, the land decays,Of corn-fields plain lays,Great men maketh

nowadaysA sheepcot of the church',

said a contemporary ballad

Latimer wrote, 'where there were a great many householders and inhabitants there

is now but a shepherd and his dog.' 'I am sorie to report it,' says Harrison,[224]

'but

most sorrowful of all to understand that men of great port and countenance are so

far from suffering their farmers to have anie gaine at all that they themselves

become graziers, butchers, tanners, sheepmasters, and woodmen, thereby to enrich

themselves.' The Act against pulling down farmhouses was evaded by repairing

one room for the use of a shepherd; a single furrow was driven across a field to

prove it was still under the plough; to avoid holding illegal numbers of sheep

flocks were held in the names of sons and servants.[225]

The country swarmed with

heaps of miserable paupers, 'sturdy and valiant' beggars, and thieves who, though

hanged twenty at a time on a single gallows, still infested all the countryside, their

numbers being swollen by the dissolution of the monasteries and the breaking up

of the bands of retainers kept by the great nobles

Rents also were rising rapidly Latimer's account of his father's farm is too well

known to be again quoted; his opinions were shared by all the writers of the day

Sir William Forrest, about 1540, says that landlords now demand fourfold rents, so

that the farmer has to raise his prices in proportion, and beef and mutton were so

dear that a poor man could not 'bye a morsell' 'Howe joyne they lordshyp to

lordshyppe, manner to manner, ferme to ferme How do the rych men, and

especially such as be shepemongers, oppresse the king's people by devourynge

their common pastures with the shepe so that the poore are not able to keepe a

cowe, but are like to starve And yet when was beef ever so dere or mutton, wool

now 8s a stone

'Now', says another, later in the century, 'I can never get a horse shoed under

10d or 12d., when I have also seen the common pryce was 6d.And cannot your

neighbour remember that within these thirty years I could bye the best pigge or

goose that I could lay my hand on for four pence which now costeth 12d., a good

capon for 3d or 4d., a hen for 2d., which now costeth me double and triple.'[226]

Parliament, of course, tried to regulate the price of food; an Act of 1532, 24 Hen

VIII, c 3, ordained that beef and pork should be 1/2d a lb and mutton and

veal 5/8d a lb The decrease in the number of cows also received its attention; 2

and 3 Philip and Mary, c 3, states that forasmuch of late years a great number of

persons have fed in their pastures sheep and cattle with no regard to breeding, so

that there was great scarcity of stock, therefore for every 60 sheep kept one milk

cow shall be kept, and for every 120 sheep one calf shall be bred, and for every 10

head of horned cattle shall be kept one milk cow, and for every two cows so kept

one calf shall be bred The Act was to last seven years, but 13 Eliz c 25 made it

perpetual

In 1549 came the rising of Robert Kett in Norfolk, the last attempt of the English

labourer to obtain redress of his wrongs by force of arms, though Kett himself

belonged to the landlord class and took the side of the people probably by accident

The petition of grievances drawn up by his followers aimed at diminishing the

power of lords of manors as regards enclosures, the keeping of dove-cots, and

other feudal wrongs 'We pray', said the insurgents, 'that all bondmen may be made

free, for God made all free with His precious blood-shedding.' The rebellion came

to nothing, and some ofthe abuses at which it was aimed were dying a natural

death, though enclosure often acted hardly on the poor man

The manorial system went on steadily decaying, and by this time the demesne

lands had much diminished in area on most manors Many parcels had been sold to

the new landlord class, who had made their fortunes in the towns and, like most

Englishmen, desired to become country gentlemen

Much of the demesne had been sold in small lots to well-off tradesmen, and as the

villeins had become copyholders a large part of the land was owned or occupied by

yeomen or tenant farmers, who cultivated from 20 to 150 acres Many of the

labourers also owned or rented cottages with 4 or 5 acres attached to them Such

was the rural society at the end of the Tudor period The progress of enclosures

helped to destroy this, for the labourers gradually ceased to own or occupy land,

farms increased in size, the ownership of land came to be more and more the

privilege of the rich, and people flocked in increasing numbers to the towns.[227a]

In

five Norfolk manors in Elizabeth's time only from one-seventh to one-tenth was in

demesne, and little of what was left was farmed by the lord, but let to farmers on