n did the same work
as the men, could earn 1d. a day, and his boy perhaps 1/2d. If his
wages were wholly paid in money, we may say that in the last half of
the fourteenth century the ordinary labourer earned 3d. a day, so that
as corn and pork, his chief food, had not risen at all, he was much
better off than in the preceding 100 years.

Cullum, in his invaluable _History of Hawsted_, gives us a picture of
harvesting on the demesne lands in 1389 which shows an extraordinarily
busy scene. There were 200 acres of all kinds of corn to be gathered
in, and over 300 people took part; though apparently such a crowd was
only collected for the two principal days of the harvest, and it must
be remembered that the towns were emptied into the country at this
important season. The number of people for one day comprised a carter,
ploughman, head reaper, cook, baker, brewer, shepherd, daya
(dairymaid); 221 hired reapers; 44 pitchers, stackers, and reapers
(not hired, evidently villeins paying their rents by work); 22 other
reapers, hired for goodwill (_de amore_); and 20 customary tenants.
This small army of men consumed 22 bushels of wheat, 8 pennyworth of
beer, and 41 bushels of malt, worth 18s. 9-1/2d.; meat to the value of
9s. 11-1/2d.; fish and herrings, 5s. 1d.; cheese, butter, milk, and
eggs, 8s. 3-1/2d.; oatmeal, 5d. salt, 3d.; pepper and saffron, 10d.,
the latter apparently introduced into England in the time of Edward
III, and much used for cooking and medicine, but it gradually went out
of fashion, and by the end of the eighteenth century was only
cultivated in one or two counties, notably Essex where Saffron Walden
recalls its use; candles, 6d.; and 5 pairs of gloves 10d.[165]

The presentation of gloves was a common custom in England; and these
would be presented as a sign of good husbandry, as in the case of the
rural bridegroom in the account of Queen Elizabeth's visit to
Kenilworth who wore gloves to show he was a good farmer. Tusser bids
the farmer give gloves to his reapers. The custom was still observed
at Hawsted in 1784, and in Eden's time, 1797, the bursars of New
College, Oxford, presented each of their tenants with two pairs, which
the recipients displayed on the following Sunday at church by
conspicuously hanging their hands over the pew to show their
neighbours they had paid their rent. In this account of the Hawsted
harvest the large number of hired men and the few customary tenants is
noteworthy as a sign