LANDMARKS IN ENGLISH AGRICULTURE

1086.  Domesday inquest, most cultivated land in tillage.  Annual value of land about 2d. an acre.

1216-72.  Henry iii.  Assize of Bread and Ale.

1272-1307.  Edward I. General progress.  Walter of Henley.

1307.  Edward ii.  Decline.

1315.  Great famine.

1337.  Export of wool prohibited.

1348-9.  Black Death.  Heavy blow to manorial system.  Many demesne lands let, and much land laid down to grass.

1351.  Statute of Labourers.

1360.  Export of corn forbidden.

1381.  Villeins’ revolt.

1393.  Richard ii allows export of corn under certain conditions.

1463.  Import of wheat under 6s. 8d. prohibited.

End of fifteenth century.  Increase of enclosure.

1523.  Fitzherbert’s Surveying and Husbandry.

1540.  General rise in prices and rents begins.

1549.  Kett’s rebellion.  The last attempt of the English peasant to obtain redress by force.

1586.  Potatoes introduced.

1601.  Poor Law Act of Elizabeth.

1645.  Turnips and clover introduced as field crops.

1662.  Statute of Parochial Settlement.

1664.  Importation of cattle, sheep, and swine forbidden.

1688.  Bounty of 5s. per quarter on export of wheat, and high duty on import.

1733.  Tull publishes his Horse-hoeing Husbandry.

1739.  Great sheep-rot.

1750.  Exports of corn reached their maximum.

1760.  Bakewell began experimenting.

1760 (about).  Industrial and agrarian revolution, and great increase of enclosure.

1764.  Elkington’s new drainage system.

1773.  Wheat allowed to be imported at a nominal duty of 6d. a quarter when over 48s.

1777.  Bath and West of England Society established, the first in England.

1789.  England definitely becomes a corn-importing country.

1793.  Board of Agriculture established.

1795.  Speenhamland Act.

About same date swedes first grown.

1815.  Duty on wheat reached its maximum.

1815-35.  Agricultural distress.

1825.  Export of wool allowed.

1835.  Smith of Deanston, the father of modern drainage.

1838.  Foundation of Royal Agricultural Society.

1846.  Repeal of the Corn Laws.

1855-75.  Great agricultural prosperity.

1875.  English agriculture feels the full effect of unrestricted competition with disastrous results.

  " First Agricultural Holdings Act.

1879-80.  Excessive rainfall, sheep-rot, and general distress.

CHAPTER I

COMMUNISTIC FARMING.—­GROWTH OF THE MANOR.—­EARLY PRICES.—­THE ORGANIZATION AND AGRICULTURE OF THE MANOR