6d. each, a price far below the average
of the time. As for wages, mowers of grass had 10d. a day, and found
their own food and their scythes, which cost them about 2s. 3d. each.
Haymakers got 4d. a day, and had to 'meat themselves' and find their
own forks and rakes. Shearers or reapers were paid from 8d. to 10d.,
and found their own sickles; binders and stackers, 8d.; mowers of
'haver', or oats, 10d., a good mower cutting 4 acres a day. In 1641 he
sold oats for 14s. a quarter, best barley for 22s., rye 27s. 6d.,
wheat 30s.[314] The roads were dreadful, and produce nearly all sent
to market on pack-horses. 'Wee seldome send fewer than 8 horse loads
to the market at a time, and with them two men, for one man cannot
guide the poakes (sacks) of above four horses. When wee sende oats to
the market wee sack them up in 3 bushel poakes and lay 6 bushels on a
horse; when wee sende wheate, rye, or masseldene (rye and wheat) and
barley to market wee put it into mette poakes (2 bushel sacks),
sometimes into half quarter sacks, and these we lay on horses that are
short coupled and well backed.' When the servants got to market they
were charged a halfpenny a horse for stabling and hay, but if they
dined at the inn they paid nothing for their horses, and their dinners
cost them 4d. a head. Butter was sold by the lb., or the 'cake' of 2
lb., and in the beginning of Lent was 5d. a lb., by April 20, 3d., in
the middle of May, 2-1/2d. When William Pinder took 50 acres of land
'of my Lord Haye' he paid a fine of L60 and a rent of L40; but this
must have been an extremely choice piece of land, for arable land
rented apparently at less than 3s. an acre.[315] The rent of a cottage
was usually 10s. a year, 'though they have not so much as a yard or
any backe side belonging to them.' There is more evidence, if such
were needed, of the beneficial effect of enclosure, which was said to
treble the value of pasture. Good meadow land fetched a great price:
'The medow Sykes is about 5 acres of grounde, and was letten in the
year 1628 at L6 per annum, and in 1635 at L6 13s. 4d.

The requirements of a foreman on a farm were that he could sow, mow,
stack peas, go well with 4 horses, and be accustomed to marketing; and
for this when hired by the year he received 5 marks, and perhaps half
a crown as earnest money. The next man got 50s., the next 46s. 6d.,
the fourth 35s. 'Christopher Pearson had the first year he dwelt here
L3 5s. 0d. wages per annum a