e clearest and briefest. The reader will of course remember,
that the coins mentioned by him bore a much higher value than coins of
the same denomination at present. 'The common labourer in the
hay-harvest is only to have 1d. a day, except a mower, who, if he mow
by the acre, is to have 5d. per acre, or otherwise 5d. a day. A reaper
is to have in time of corn-harvest 2d., the first week in August, and
3d. till the end of the month; and they are likewise neither to ask
meat nor any other perquisite or indulgence. The law likewise requires
that they shall repair to the next town or village, carrying their
scythe or sickle openly in their hands, and shall there be hired in
some public place.... The second chapter directs that no man in
harvest--before settled to be in the month of August--shall leave the
village in which he lived during the winter, except the inhabitants of
Staffordshire, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Craven, and the marches of
Wales and Scotland--the occasion of which is, that there are large
tracts of mountain or moorland in all these counties and districts,
where nothing can be raised but oats, which are not usually ripe till
October; and, consequently, if they were not employed in more early
harvest, they would be without employment during the months of August
and September.'

But the English peasantry and artisans had now acquired too much real
independence to submit silently to these arbitrary regulations. The
celebrated insurrection of Wat Tyler, which took place thirty years
afterwards, was a concentrated embodiment of popular discontent.
However turbulent and dangerous might be the form in which the mob
demanded redress, the demands themselves were in many respects very
reasonable. Thus, the brief statement of them by Hume, the historian,
is, that they 'required a general pardon, _the abolition of slavery_,
freedom of commerce in market-towns without toll or impost, and a
fixed rent on lands, instead of the services due by villenage'--that
is to say, they desired that they should be tenants, paying rent in
money or services, and not serfs bound to remain on the soil. The
insurrection was crushed, and the insurgents obtained no immediate
redress. Parliament, however, considered the whole circumstances
before the conclusion of Richard II.'s reign. Wat Tyler's rebellion
was nearly contemporary with several other risings throughout Europe
of the enslaved working-classes against their tyrants. In France, the