According to Harrison[59] the standard of comfort among the agricultural classes rose markedly at this time. Chimneys became common, pewter plates and silver or tin spoons are used in place of "tinn platters and wooden spoons." A farmer thinks his gains very small "if he have not a fair garnish of pewter on his cupboard, with so much more in odd vessels going about the house, three or four feather-beds, so manie coverlids or carpets of tapestry, a silver salt, a bowl for wine if not a whole nest, and a dozen of spoons to furnish up the suit." Food, too, according to Harrison, was plentiful and varied. The increase in pasture farming and the decrease in arable land had made meat (often, it is true, salted) cheaper and corn-stuffs dearer, at least in proportion. This tendency can be traced in the menus and accounts of the period, and certainly appears in the following extract:[60] "The artificers and husbandmen make greatest account of such food as they may soonest come by and have it quickliest ready. Their food also consisteth principallie in beef and such meat as the butcher selleth; that is to saie, mutton, veal, lamb, pork, whereof he findeth great store in the markets adjoining, besides souse,[61] brawn, bacon, fruit, pies of fruit, fowles of sundrie sort, cheese, butter, eggs." A little lower down he notes that venison and a cup of wine are luxuries reserved for special occasions. It is not easy to estimate the worth of Harrison's testimony to the social habits of a class which he did not probably know intimately. It is certain, too, that he was not speaking here of the poorest class of labourers,[62] those who later recruited the class eligible for poor-law relief. But even making these admissions, his words seem to be evidence of a standard of comfort higher in some respects than could be attained by the corresponding classes to-day. Chicken, for instance, practically never forms part of the dietary of even the well-to-do urban artisan of the present time.