iseases of stock in the Middle Ages, and is of constant
occurrence in old records.

[114] The cause of this as usual was incessant rain during the greater
part of the summer; the chronicles of the time say that not only were
the crops very short but those that did grow were diseased and yielded
no nourishment. The 'murrain' was so deadly to oxen and sheep that,
according to Walsingham, dogs and ravens eating them dropped down
dead.

[115] See Cunningham, _Industry and Commerce_, i. 335. Also in an age
when the idea of Competitive price had not yet been evolved, and when
regulation by authority was the custom, it was natural and right that
the Government in such a crisis should try to check the demands of
both labourers and producers, which went far beyond what employers or
consumers could pay. Putnam, _Enforcement of the Statute of
Labourers_, 220.

[116] The average price of wheat in 1351 was 10s. 2-1/2d., which went
down to 7s. 2d. next year, and 4s. 2-1/2d. the year after; but judging
by the ineffectiveness of the statute to reduce wages, it probably had
little effect in causing this fall.

[117] See Appendix I.

[118] Putnam, _op. cit._, 221. The statute for the first ten years,
however, kept wages from ascending as high as might have been the
case.

[119] McPherson, _Annals of Commerce_, i. 543, says that as the plague
diminished the number of employers as well as labourers, the demand
for labour could not have been much greater than before, and would
have had little effect on the rate of if Edward III had not debased
the coinage. But if the owners did decrease the lands would only
accumulate in fewer hands, and would still require cultivation.

[120] Page, _End of Villeinage_, pp. 59 et seq.

[121] Ibid. p. 44.

[122] _Transactions_, Royal Historical Society, New Series, xiv. 123.

[123] This had been done before, but was now much more frequent.
Hasbach, _op. cit._ p. 17.

[124] 'After the Black Death the flight of villeins was extremely
common.'--Page, _op. cit._, p. 40.

[125] Nasse, _Agricultural Community of the Middle Ages_, p. 1.

[126] Cunningham, _Industry and Commerce_, i. 137.

CHAPTER IV

HOW THE CLASSES CONNECTED WITH THE LAND LIVED IN THE MIDDLE AGES

The castles of the great landowners have been so often described that
there is no need to do this again. The popular idea of a baron of the
Middle Ages is of a man who when he was not fighting was jousting or
hunting. Such w