were 577,000 acres of arable; in 1907, 178,967. In Gloucestershire, in
1086, 589,000 acres; in 1907, 238,456.[54] These are extreme
instances; but the preponderance of arable is startling, even if we
allow for the recent conversion of arable to pasture on account of the
low price of corn. Between the eleventh century and the sixteenth, the
laying down of land to grass must have proceeded on a gigantic scale,
for Harrison tells us that in his day England was mainly a grazing
country. No wonder Harrison's contemporaries complained of the decay
of tillage.

Mediaeval prices and statistics are, it is well known, to be taken
with great caution; but we may assume that the normal annual value of
land under cultivation in 1086 was about 2d. an acre.[55] Land indeed,
apart from the stock upon it, was worth very little: in the tenth and
eleventh centuries it appears that the hide, normally of 120 acres,
was only worth £5 to buy, apparently with the stock upon it. In the
time of Athelstan a horse was worth 120d., an ox 30d., a cow 20d., a
sheep 5d., a hog 8d., a slave £1--so that a slave was worth 8
oxen[56]; and these prices do not seem to have advanced by the
Domesday period.

According to the Pipe Roll of 1156, wheat was 1s. 6d. a quarter; but
prices then depended entirely on seasons, and we do not know whether
that was good or bad. However, many years later, in 1243 it was only
2s. a quarter at Hawsted.[57] In dear years, nearly always the result
of wet seasons, it went up enormously; in 1024 the English Chronicle
tells us the acre seed of wheat, that is about 2 bushels, sold for
4s.,[58] 3 bushels of barley for 6s. and 4 bushels of oats for 4s. In
1190 Holinshed says that, owing to a great dearth, the quarter of
wheat was 18s. 8d. The average price, however, in the twelfth century