is carried. The men of North Dichton were also
to have all the wood called Rouhowthwicke, and to do what they liked
with it.[191] In return they gave the lord 10 marks of silver and a
concession as regards a certain wood. It has been noticed that the
Black Death, besides causing many of the landlords to let their
demesnes, also made them turn much tillage into grass to save labour,
which had grown so dear. We have also seen that the statutes
regulating wages were of little effect, and they went on rising, so
that more land was laid down to grass. The landowners may be said to
have given up ordinary farming and turned to sheep raising.

English wool could always find a ready sale, although Spanish sheep
farming had developed greatly; and the profitable trade of growing
wool attracted the new capitalist class who had sprung up, so that
they often invested their recently made fortunes in it, buying up many
of the great estates that were scattered during the war.[192]

The increase of sheep farming was assisted by the fact that the
domestic system of the manufacture of wool, which supplanted the guild
system, led, owing to its rapid and successful growth, to a constant
and increasing demand for wool. At the same time this development of
the cloth industry helped to alleviate the evils it had itself caused
by giving employment to many whom the agricultural changes wholly or
partially deprived of work. 'It is important to remember, that where
peasant proprietorship and small farming did maintain their ground it
was largely due to the domestic industries which supplemented the
profits of agriculture.'[193]

Much of the land laid down to grass was demesne land, but many of the
common arable fields were enclosed and laid down. John Ross of Warwick
about 1460 compares the country as he knew it with the picture
presented by the Hundred Rolls in Edward I's time, showing how many
villages had been depopulated; and he mentions the inconvenience to
travellers in having to get down frequently to open the gates of
enclosed fields.[194]

Enclosure was really a sure sign of agricultural progress; nearly all
the agricultural writers from Fitzherbert onwards are agreed that
enclosed land produced much more than uninclosed. Fitzherbert, in the
first quarter of the sixteenth century, said an acre of land rented
for 6d. uninclosed was worth 8d. when enclosed. Gabriel Plattes, in
the seventeenth century, said an acre enclosed was worth four