WAGES IN 17TH AND 19TH CENTURIES.

Running my eye accidentally through the household book of Sir Roger
Twysden, from 1659 to 1670, it occurred to me to make a comparison
between the relative prices of meat and wages, as there given, in
order to ascertain the position of our peasantry in these parts, at
the close of the 17th century. I send you a few extracts, by which
it will be seen that, in Kent, at least, our agricultural labourers
appear to have been in far better condition than those of the rest
of England, who, in Mr. Macaulay's brilliant work, are represented
as living "almost entirely on rye, barley, and oats," owing to the
exorbitantly high price of meat, as compared with the ordinary scale
of wages.

As to meat, I find the following entries:--

"1659. Beef
2s. and 1s. 8d. per stone.
a loin of mutton 1s. 6d.
1662. Beef 2s. per stone.
a shin of beef 1s. 10d.
a loin of veal 3s. 4d.
a calve's head 1s. 2d.
a quarter of mutton 4s. 4d. and 5s.
a side of mutton 9s.
1664. 8 quarters of mutton 32s.
1 quarter of do. 4s.
6 stone of beef 10s. 4d.
1666. 6 stone of beef 10s. 4d.