freeholds in the country and swelled the numbers of yeomen.

[131] Harrison, _Description of Britain_, F.J. Furnivall edn., p. 337.

[132] _Domesday of S. Paul_, Camden Society, p. 129.

[133] Turner, _Domestic Architecture_, i. 59.

[134] _Domesday of S. Paul_, p. 123.

[135] _Historical MSS. Commission Report_, v. 444.

[136] Ormerod, _History of Cheshire_, i. 129.

[137] _Domesday of S. Paul_, p. xcvii.

[138] Denton, _England in the Fifteenth Century_.

[139] Eden, _State of the Poor_, i. 21.

[140] See Cullum, _History of Hawsted_.

[141] Harrison, _Description of Britain_, Appendix ii, lxxxi. In some
manors, however, there were careful regulations for public health.
According to the Durham _Halmote Rolls_, published by the Surtees
Society, village officials watched over the water supply, prevented
the fouling of streams; bye-laws were enacted as to the regulation of
the common place for clothes washing, and the times for emptying and
cleansing ponds and mill-dams.

[142] Ballard, _Domesday_, Antiquary Series, p. 209.

[143] Walter of Henley, Royal Historical Society, p. 75.

[144] Cullum, _Hawsted_, 1784 ed., p. 182.

[145] _State of the Poor_, i. 15.

[146] Thorold Rogers, _History of Agriculture and Prices_, i. 32.

[147] See _Knights Hospitallers in England_, Camden Society,
Introduction.

[148] Thorold Rogers, _op. cit._ i. 66.

CHAPTER V

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

We have seen that the landlords' profits were seriously diminished by
the Black Death, and they cast about them for new ways of increasing
their incomes. Arable land had been until now largely in excess of
pasture, the cultivation of corn was the chief object of agriculture,
bread forming a much larger proportion of men's diet than now. This
began to change. Much of the land was laid down to grass, and there
was a steady increase in sheep farming; thus commenced that revolution
in farming which in the sixteenth century led Harrison to say that
England was mainly a stock-raising country. The lords also let a
considerable amount of their demesne land on leases for years. 'Then
began the times to alter' says Smyth of the Lord Berkeley of the end
of the fourteenth century, 'and hee with them, and he began to tack
other men's cattle on his pasture by the week, month, and qua