aying
thereto four acres of land, being his own freehold and inheritance,
lying near the cottage, under a penalty of L10; and for upholding any
such cottages, there was a penalty imposed of 40s. a month, exception
being made as to any city, town, corporation, ancient borough, or market
town; and no person was permitted to allow more than one family to
reside in each cottage, under a penalty of 10s. per month."

The 39th Elizabeth, cap. 2, was passed to enforce the observance of
these conditions. It provides:

"That all lands which had been in tillage shall be restored thereto
within three years, except in cases where they were worn out by too much
tillage, in which case they might be grazed with sheep; but in order to
prevent the deterioriation of the land, it was enacted that the quantity
of beeves or muttons sold off the land should not exceed that which was
consumed in the mansion-house."

In these various enactments of the Tudor monarchs we may trace the
anxious desire of these sovereigns to repair the mistake of Henry VII.,
and to prevent the depopulation of England. A similar mistake has been
made in Ireland since 1846, under which the homes of the peasantry have
been prostrated, the land thrown out of tillage, and the people driven
from their native land. Mr. Froude has the following remarks upon this
legislation:

"Statesmen (temp. Elizabeth) did not care for the accumulation of
capital. They desired to see the physical well-being of all classes of
the commonwealth maintained in the highest degree which the producing
power of the country admitted. This was their object, and they were
supported in it by a powerful and efficient majority of the nation. At
one time Parliament interfered to protect employers against laborers,
but it was equally determined that employers should not be allowed to
abuse their opportunities; and this directly appears from the 4th and
5th Elizabeth, by which, on the most trifling appearance of a diminution
of the currency, it was declared that the laboring man could no longer
live on the wages assigned to him by the Act of Henry VIII.; and a
sliding scale was instituted, by which, for the future, wages should be
adjusted to the price of food. The same conclusion may be gathered
also indirectly fom the acts interfering imperiously with the rights of
property where a disposition showed itself to exercise them selfishly.

"The city merchants, as I have said, were becoming landowners, a