"That one milch-cow shall be kept and calf reared for every sixty
sheep and ten oxen during the following seven years."

The 2d Elizabeth, cap. 2, confirms the previously quoted acts of 4
Henry VII., cap. 19; 7 Henry VIII., cap. 1; 27 Henry VIII., cap.
22; 27 Henry VIII., cap. 18; and it enacts:

"That all farm-houses belonging to suppressed monasteries should be
kept up, and that all lands which had been in tillage for four
years successively at any time since the 20th Henry VIII., should
be kept in tillage under a penalty of 10s. per acre, which was
payable to the heir in reversion, or in case he did not levy it, to
the Crown."

31 Elizabeth, cap. 7, went further; and in order to provide
allotments for the cottagers, many of whom were dispossessed from
their land, it provided:

"For avoiding the great inconvenience which is found by experience
to grow by the erecting and building of great number of cottages,
which daily more and more increased in many parts of the realm, it
was enacted that no person should build a cottage for habitation or
dwelling, nor convert any building into a cottage, without
assigning and laying 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,