Another fact worth noticing in the Gloucester instance is the irregular distribution of acres in the 'fields,' and the division of the entire arable into four unequal parts. The husbandry is conducted on the three-course system, and still four fields are mentioned, and there is no simple relation between the number of acres which they respectively contain (174, 63, 109, 69). It seems obvious that the expression 'field' (_campus_) is used here not in the ordinary sense suggested by such records as spring-field, winter-field, and the like, but in reference to the topography of the district. The whole territory under cultivation was divided into a number of squares or furlongs which lay round the village in four large groups. The alternation of crops distributed the same area into three according to a mode not described by the Survey, and it looks probable at first glance that each of the 'fields' (_campi_) contained elements of all three courses. The supposition becomes a certainty, if we reflect that it gives the only possible explanation of the way in which the twofold alternation of the 'inhoc' is made to fit with the threefold rotation of crops: every year some of the land in each _campus_ had to remain in fallow, and could be inclosed or taken under 'inhoc.' Had the _campus_ as a whole been reserved for one of the three courses, there would have been room for the 'inhoc' only every three years. I have gone into some details in connexion with this instance because it presents a deviation from ordinary rules, and even a deviation from the usual phraseology, and it is probable that the exceptional use of words depended on the exceptional process of farming. A new species of arable--the manured plot under 'inhoc'--came into use, and naturally disturbed the plain arrangement of the old-fashioned three courses; the lands had to be grouped anew into four sections which went under the accustomed designation of 'fields,' although they did not fit in with the 'three fields' of the old system. In most cases, however, our records use the word 'field' (_campus_) in that very sense of land under one of the 'courses,' which is out of the question in the case taken from the Gloucester Cartulary. The common use is especially clear when the documents want to describe the holding of a person, and mention the number of acres in each 'field,' The Abbot of Malmesbury, e.g., enfeoffs one Robert with a virgate formerly held 'in the fields' by A., twenty-one acres in one field and twenty-one in another[460]. The charter does not contain any description of _campi_ in the territorial sense, and it is evident that the expression 'in the fields' is meant to indicate a customary and well-known husbandry arrangement. The same meaning must be put on sentences like the following--R.A. holds a virgate consisting of forty-two acres in both fields[461]. The question may be raised whether we have to look for 'both fields' in the winter