Only the county of Stafford has been considered. If it be objected that, the work being thus restricted in scope, the results must be of limited application, it may be pointed out that there are compensating advantages. The material is comparatively manageable. The details, bewildering and difficult of explanation though they often are, are comparatively amenable. Acquaintance with localities may sometimes render assistance. The results, therefore, may gain in precision what they lack in range, and though the writer does not suppose he has succeeded, or nearly succeeded, in solving all or many of the problems which arise, yet he hopes that he has been able to accomplish something. Possibly the national aspect of the whole subject must wait for final treatment until the work of local investigators has been completed. Reliable information has been sought on such points as the following: the amount of the monastic wealth, its sources and burdens, the relative proportions from temporal and spiritual sources, the extent to which parish churches were “robbed,” the solvency or otherwise of the religious houses, the extent of their charity, the amount of educational work they carried on, their character as landlords, the part they took in the agricultural changes of the period, the material effects of their suppression, and other subjects of a kindred nature. It must be acknowledged at once that the results vary much in character. The _data_ are often difficult to interpret and are sometimes too scanty to be of much use in drawing general conclusions of any value. In particular it has proved to be quite impossible to attempt any estimate of the area of monastic lands. The situation and character of the various possessions can be found, and the income derived from each, but the acreage is seldom given, and no attempt has been made to reckon the extent from the value. Such an attempt has been sometimes made, usually by proposing a ratio between income and acreage. It is generally supposed that the occupied area of England was about thirty-two millions of acres. Thorold Rogers states that at the time of the Dissolution “the rent of agricultural land was from 6d. to 8d. an acre.” It is true that the greater part of the land held by the monasteries was probably agricultural, so that if we divide some estimates which have been given of the total monastic income by 7d. we obtain the following results: £171,300 (Speed) ÷ 7d. = 5,873,143 acres or about two-elevenths of the whole. £131,607 (Burnet) ÷ 7d. = 4,512,240 acres, or more than one-seventh of the whole. A similar calculation for Staffordshire (748,433 acres), taking the figures to be given in Chapter IV, would give the following results: Gross total monastic income, £1,874 0s. 1½d. ÷ 7d. = 64,251 acres, or more than one-eleventh of the whole county; Net monastic income, £1,608 5s. 2¾d. ÷ 7d. = 55,140 acres, or more than one-thirteenth of the whole county.