Cattle were sometimes of a great size.  In 1697, in the park of Sir John Fagg near Steyning, Defoe saw four bullocks of Sir John’s own breeding for which was refused in Defoe’s hearing L26 apiece.  They were driven to Smithfield and realized L25 each, having probably sunk on the way, but dressed they weighed 80 stone a quarter![392] These weights must have been very exceptional, but go to prove that cattle then could be grown to much greater size than is generally credited.  A good price for a bullock in the first half of the eighteenth century was from L7 to L10.

The best poultry at the same date (1736) were said to be ’the white-feathered sort’, especially those that had short and white legs, which were esteemed for the whiteness of their flesh; but those that had long yellow legs and yellow beaks were considered good for nothing.[393] Care was to be used in the choice of a cock, for those of the game kind were to be avoided as unprofitable.  Bradley gives a balance sheet for 12 hens and 2 cocks who had a free run in a farmyard and an orchard:[394]

DR. L s. d.

39 bushels of barley 3 5 0
Balance, profit 16 0
----------
L4 1 0
==========

CR.  L s. d.

Eggs (number unfortunately not given) 1 5 0
20 early chickens at 1s. 1 0 0
72 late chickens at 6d. 1 16 0
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L4 1 0
==========

He also recommends that in stocking a farm of L200 a year the following poultry should be purchased: 

L s. d.

24 chickens at 4d. 8 0 20 geese 1 0 0 20 turkeys 1 0 0 24 ducks 12 0 6 pair of pigeons 12 0

The best way to fatten chickens, according to Bradley, was to put them in coops and feed them with barley meal, being careful to put a small quantity of brickdust in their water to give them an appetite.[395]

On this farm were 20 acres of cow pasture besides common, and this with some turnips kept 9 cows, which gave about three gallons of milk a day at least, the milk being worth 1d. a quart.  His pigs were of the ‘Black Bantham’ breed, which were better than the large sort common in England, for the flesh was much more delicate.

Suffolk was famous for supplying London with turkeys.[396] Three hundred droves of turkeys, each numbering from 300 to 1000, had in one season passed over Stratford Bridge on the road from Ipswich to London.  Geese also travelled on foot to London in prodigious numbers from Norfolk, Suffolk, and the Fen country, often 1,000 to 3,000 in a drove, starting in August when harvest was nearly over, so that the geese might feed on the stubble by the way; ’and thus they hold on to the end of October, when the roads begin to be too stiff and deep for their broad feet and short legs to march on.’  There was, however, a more rapid method of getting poultry to the great market, by means of carts of four stages or stories, one above another, to carry the birds in, drawn by two horses, which by means of relays travelled night and day, and covered as much as 100 miles in two days and one night, the driver sitting on the topmost stage.