The extent of the population can only be rudely conjectured. A rough census
was taken at the time of the Armada, when it was found to be something
under five millions; but anterior to this I can find no authority on which
I can rely with any sort of confidence. It is my impression, however, from
a number of reasons--each in itself insignificant, but which taken together
leave little doubt upon my mind--that it had attained that number by a
growth so slow as to be scarcely perceptible, and had nearly approached to
it many generations before. Simon Fish, in _The Supplication of
Beggars_,[1] says that the number of households in England in 1531 was
520,000. His calculation is of the most random kind; for he rates the
number of parishes at 52,000, with ten households on an average in each
parish. A mistake so preposterous respecting the number of parishes shows
the great ignorance of educated men upon the subject. The ten households in
each parish may, probably (in some parts of the country), have been a
correct computation; but this tells us little with respect to the aggregate
numbers, for the households were very large--the farmers, and the gentlemen
also, usually having all the persons whom they employed residing under
their own roof. Neither from this, therefore, nor from any other positive
statement which I have seen, can I gather any conclusion that may be
depended upon. But when we remember the exceeding slowness with which the
population multiplied in a time in which we can accurately measure it--that
is to say, from 1588 to the opening of the last century--under
circumstances in every way more favourable to an increase, I think we may
assume that the increase was not so great between 1500 and 1588, and that,
previous to 1500, it did not more than keep pace with the waste from civil
and foreign war. The causes, indeed, were wholly wanting which lead to a
rapid growth of numbers. Numbers now increase with the increase of
employment and with the facilities which are provided by the modern system
of labour for the establishment of independent households. At present, any