[350] The seedlip was a long-shaped basket suspended from the sower's shoulder and was usually made of wood. [351] Horse-girths for securing pack-saddles. [352] Houghton, about the same time, said England contained 28 to 29 million acres, of which 12 millions lay waste (_Collections_, iv. II). In 1907 the Board of Agriculture returned the total area of England and Wales, excluding water, at 37,130,344 acres. [353] Eden, _State of the Poor_, i. 228. [354] If we allow that most of the two last classes enumerated were country folk. For the decline of the yeoman class, see chap. xviii. [355] Evelyn's _Diary_. [356] Tooke, _History of Prices_, i. 23. [357] Fowle, _Poor Law_, p. 63. [358] Hasbach, _op. cit._ p. 66, says, 'the abuses complained of in the preamble (of the Act) did actually exist.' [359] Hasbach, _op. cit._ pp. 67, 134, says the statute of 1662 did not entail so much evil by hindering migration as is generally supposed. [360] _Shropshire County Records_: Abstracts of the orders made by the Court of Quarter Sessions, 1638-1782, pp. xxiv, xxv. [361] See above, p. 70. 13 Eliz., c. 13. McCulloch, _Commercial Dictionary_ (1852), p. 412. [362] Cunningham, _English Industry and Commerce_, ii. 371. [363] _Political Arithmetic_, pp. 27-34, 193, 276. [364] Lecky, _England in the Eighteenth Century_, vi. 192. [365] McPherson, _Annals of Commerce_, iii. 311. [366] Ibid. ii. 706; iii. 221, 293. CHAPTER XIV 1700-1765 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.--CROPS.--CATTLE.-- DAIRYING.--POULTRY.--TULL AND THE NEW HUSBANDRY.--BAD TIMES. --FRUIT-GROWING