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قراءة كتاب A Short History of English Agriculture
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A Short History of English Agriculture
A SHORT HISTORY
OF
ENGLISH AGRICULTURE
BY
W.H.R. CURTLER
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
1909
HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
LONDON, EDINBURGH, NEW YORK
TORONTO AND MELBOURNE
PREFACE
'A husbandman', said Markham, 'is the master of the earth, turning barrenness into fruitfulness, whereby all commonwealths are maintained and upheld. His labour giveth liberty to all vocations, arts, and trades to follow their several functions with peace and industrie. What can we say in this world is profitable where husbandry is wanting, it being the great nerve and sinew which holdeth together all the joints of a monarchy?' And he is confirmed by Young: 'Agriculture is, beyond all doubt, the foundation of every other art, business, and profession, and it has therefore been the ideal policy of every wise and prudent people to encourage it to the utmost.' Yet of this important industry, still the greatest in England, there is no history covering the whole period.
It is to remedy this defect that this book is offered, with much diffidence, and with many thanks to Mr. C.R.L. Fletcher of Magdalen College, Oxford, for his valuable assistance in revising the proof sheets, and to the Rev. A.H. Johnson of All Souls for some very useful information.
As the agriculture of the Middle Ages has often been ably described, I have devoted the greater part of this work to the agricultural history of the subsequent period, especially the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries.
May 22, 1909.
CONTENTS
Communistic Farming.—Growth of the Manor.—Early Prices.—The Organization and Agriculture of the Manor
The Thirteenth Century.—The Manor at its Zenith, with Seeds of Decay already visible.—Walter of Henley
The Fourteenth Century.—Decline of Agriculture.—The Black Death.— Statute of Labourers
How the Classes connected with the Land lived in the Middle Ages
The Break-up of the Manor.—Spread of Leases.—The Peasants' Revolt.—Further Attempts to regulate Wages.—A Harvest Home.—Beginning of the Corn Laws.—Some Surrey Manors
1400-1540. The so-called 'Golden Age of the Labourer' in a Period of General Distress
Enclosure
Fitzherbert.—The Regulation of Hours and Wages
1540-1600. Progress at last—Hop-growing.—Progress of Enclosure.— Harrison's Description
1540-1600. Live Stock.—Flax.—Saffron.—The Potato.—The Assessment of Wages
1600-1700. Clover and Turnips.—Great Rise in Prices.—More Enclosure.—A Farming Calendar
The Great Agricultural Writers of the Seventeenth Century.—Fruit-growing. —A Seventeenth-century Orchard
The Evils of Common Fields.—Hops.—Implements.—Manures.—Gregory King.—Corn Laws
1700-65. General Characteristics of the Eighteenth Century.—Crops. —Cattle.—Dairying.—Poultry.—Tull and the New Husbandry.—Bad Times.—Fruit-growing
1700-65. Townshend.—Sheep-rot.—Cattle Plague.—Fruit-growing
1765-93. Arthur Young.—Crops and their Cost.—The Labourers' Wages and Diet.—The Prosperity of Farmers.—The Country Squire.—Elkington.—Bakewell.—The Roads.—Coke of Holkham
1793-1815. The Great French War.—The Board of Agriculture.—High Prices, and Heavy Taxation
Enclosure.—The Small Owner
1816-37. Depression
1837-75. Revival of Agriculture.—The Royal Agricultural Society.—Corn Law Repeal.—A Temporary Set-back.—The Halcyon Days