Vancouver, the reporter for Cambridgeshire, gives an estimate of the areas of lands of different description, which I slightly rearrange below.
| —— | Unenclosed. | Enclosed. | Doubtful. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Acres. | Acres. | Acres. | |
| Enclosed arable | — | 15,000 | — |
| Open field arable | 132,000 | — | — |
| Improved pasture | — | 52,000 | — |
| Inferior pasture | — | — | 19,800 |
| Improved fen | — | 50,000 | — |
| Woodland | — | — | 1,000 |
| Waste and unimproved fen | 150,000 | — | — |
| Half-yearly meadow land | 2,000 | — | — |
| Highland common | 7,500 | — | — |
| Fen or moor common | 8,000 | — | — |
| Heath and sheepwalk | 6,000 | — | — |
| 305,500 | 117,000 | 20,800 | |
| Total area, 443,300 acres. | |||
The actual area of Cambridgeshire is 549,723 acres; but Vancouver was an exact and careful observer, and the proportions between the areas assigned to each description were no doubt reasonably accurate. Here we find over two-thirds of the total area unenclosed, and more than eight-ninths of the arable land. It is, of course, possible, probable even, that a larger amount than 15,000 acres of open field arable had undergone enclosure, and that the 52,000 acres of improved pasture includes a good deal of such land, laid down in grass on enclosure. But even if we included the whole, there would only be 67,000 acres of ancient common field arable which had undergone enclosure, compared with 132,000 acres still open.
Vancouver also gives detailed accounts of ninety-eight of the Cambridgeshire parishes, eighty-three of which were open, fifteen enclosed. Of those which were open in 1793, seventy-four have since been enclosed by Act of Parliament, nine have not, viz., Babraham, Boxworth, Downham, Ely, Littleport, Lolworth, Madingley, Soham and Over.
Babraham had 1,350 acres of common field, and Vancouver says that enclosure was desired. It was completely effected before the date of tithe commutation.
Boxworth had 900 acres of common field. “The whole of this parish,” says Vancouver, “lies within a ring fence and containing 2,100 acres, is the property of one gentlemen.” Vancouver’s acres, as we have seen, are large ones; the actual area is 2,526 acres. Enclosure was effected before the date of tithe commutation, and as might be supposed under the circumstances, without an Act.
Downham had, according to Vancouver, 680 acres of common field; the tithe map indicates 450 acres still remaining.
To Ely he assigns 2,100 acres of common field. This had all gone at the time of tithe commutation.
Of 345 acres assigned to Littleport, a remnant of forty acres survived to be recorded in the tithe map.
The common field land of Lolworth suffered no diminution; for while Vancouver gives it 650 acres, the tithe map indicates 800 acres. They were enclosed at the time of the Crimean war by common agreement of the owners, without an Act. This was the last surviving common field parish in the vicinity.