17. AN ACT FOR THE MAINTENANCE OF HUSBANDRY AND TILLAGE [_39 Eliz. c. 2, Statutes of the Realm, Vol. IV., Part II. pp. 893-96_], 1597-8. Whereas the strength and flourishing estate of this kingdom hath been always and is greatly upheld and advanced by the maintenance of the plough and tillage, being the occasion of the increase and multiplying of people both for service in the wars and in times of peace, being also a principal means that people are set on work, and thereby withdrawn from idleness, drunkenness, unlawful games and all other lewd practices and conditions of life; and whereas by the same means of tillage and husbandry the greater part of the subjects are preserved from extreme poverty in a competent estate of maintenance and means to live, and the wealth of the realm is kept dispersed and distributed in many hands, where it is more ready to answer all necessary charges for the service of the realm; and whereas also the said husbandry and tillage is a cause that the realm doth more stand upon itself, without depending upon foreign countries either for bringing in of corn in time of scarcity, or for vent and utterance of our own commodities being in over great abundance; and whereas from the 27th year of King Henry VIII of famous memory, until the five and thirtieth year of Her Majesty's most happy reign, there was always in force some law which did ordain a conversion and continuance of a certain quantity and apportion of land in tillage not to be altered; and that in the last parliament held in the said five and thirtieth year of her Majesty's reign, partly by reason of the great plenty and cheapness of grain at that time within this realm, and partly by reason of the imperfection and obscurity of the law made in that case, the same was discontinued; since which time there have grown many more depopulations, by turning tillage into pasture, than at any time for the like number of years heretofore: Be it enacted ... that whereas any lands or grounds at any time since the seventeenth of November in the first year of Her Majesty's reign have been converted to sheep pastures or to the fattening or grazing of cattle, the same lands having been tillable lands, fields or grounds such as have been used in tillage by the space of twelve years together at the least next before such conversion, according to the nature of the soil and course of husbandry used in that part of the country, all such lands and grounds as aforesaid shall, before the first day of May which shall be in the year of Our Lord God 1599, be restored to tillage, or laid for tillage in such sort as the whole ground, according to the nature of that soil and course of husbandry used in that part of the country, be within three years at the least turned to tillage by the occupiers and possessors thereof, and so shall be continued for ever.