[348] Tull, in his Horseshoeing Husbandry (p. 147), speaks of the drill as if already in use.

[349] Worlidge, Systema Agriculturae, p. 205.

[350] The seedlip was a long-shaped basket suspended from the sower’s shoulder and was usually made of wood.

[351] Horse-girths for securing pack-saddles.

[352] Houghton, about the same time, said England contained 28 to 29 million acres, of which 12 millions lay waste (Collections, iv.  II).  In 1907 the Board of Agriculture returned the total area of England and Wales, excluding water, at 37,130,344 acres.

[353] Eden, State of the Poor, i. 228.

[354] If we allow that most of the two last classes enumerated were country folk.  For the decline of the yeoman class, see chap. xviii.

[355] Evelyn’s Diary.

[356] Tooke, History of Prices, i. 23.

[357] Fowle, Poor Law, p. 63.

[358] Hasbach, op. cit. p. 66, says, ’the abuses complained of in the preamble (of the Act) did actually exist.’

[359] Hasbach, op. cit. pp. 67, 134, says the statute of 1662 did not entail so much evil by hindering migration as is generally supposed.

[360] Shropshire County Records:  Abstracts of the orders made by the Court of Quarter Sessions, 1638-1782, pp. xxiv, xxv.

[361] See above, p. 70. 13 Eliz., c. 13.  McCulloch, Commercial Dictionary (1852), p. 412.

[362] Cunningham, English Industry and Commerce, ii. 371.

[363] Political Arithmetic, pp. 27-34, 193, 276.

[364] Lecky, England in the Eighteenth Century, vi. 192.

[365] McPherson, Annals of Commerce, iii. 311.

[366] Ibid. ii. 706; iii. 221, 293.

CHAPTER XIV

1700-1765

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.—­CROPS.—­CATTLE.—­ DAIRYING.—­POULTRY.—­TULL AND THE NEW HUSBANDRY.—­BAD TIMES.  —­FRUIT-GROWING

The history of agriculture in the eighteenth century is remarkable for several features of great importance.  It first saw the application of capital in large quantities to farming, the improvements of the time being largely initiated by rich landowners whom Young praises rightly as public-spirited men who deserved well of their country, though Thorold Rogers attributes a meaner motive for the improvement of their estates, namely, their desire not to be outshone by the wealthy merchants.[367] They were often ably assisted by tenant farmers, many of whom were now men with considerable capital, for whom the smaller farms were amalgamated into large ones.  After the agricultural revolution of the latter half of the century, the tendency to consolidate small holdings into large farms grew apace and was looked on as a decided mark of progress.  This agricultural revolution was largely a result of the