At the beginning of the 14th century most of the cultivators were still bound to the soil[184], but the first germs of a thorough [[366]]change were already present. There were free tenants who could sell their lands; tenancies at will already occurred, though not frequently[185]; and a class of free labourers arose. In Grossteste’s rules, dating from 1240 or 1241, it is said that servants and retainers “are to do what they are bid immediately without any grumbling or contradiction; if they show any such disloyal spirit they must be dismissed, for many can be had to fill their places”[186]. And there were also agricultural labourers who, though holding small pieces of land, had not enough land to live upon, and were partially dependent on wages. Even where the peasants were still obliged to cultivate the demesne, they did not usually perform such work themselves, but hired labourers to do it; the usual phrase is that they have to “find” a man for the work[187].
Here again our theory holds. Population had increased, land became scarce, and the transition from serfdom to freedom commenced. If the population of England had continued increasing, most of the villeins would probably have become freeholders or copyholders, whereas the lands that the lords had kept in their own hands would have been leased. And poor people who had neither land of their own nor capital enough to become farmers would have served for wages.
But an unexpected event entirely changed the economic condition of England. The Black Death, which made its first appearance in 1349, swept away a large part of the population. Whole villages were practically annihilated and large tracts of land went out of tillage. The economic consequences were such as we should expect. “As one immediate result there was great difficulty in getting labourers; the difficulty was aggravated in those cases where the tenants had died off and the lords were left with large holdings on their hands and no means of working them; while they lost the predial services of these deceased tenants on the home farm. There was consequently an immensely increased demand for hired labourers at the very time when their numbers were so much thinned, and it seemed as if the agriculture of the country was completely [[367]]ruined”[188]. Land was now again abundant, and so “instead of ousting tenants, lords of land found it hard enough to retain them even with lightened services”[189]. And the natural consequence was that the landlords attempted to re-attach tenants and labourers to the soil. Whether, as Professor Thorold Rogers asserts, the customary tenants, who had commuted their labour dues for money, were forced back into the servile position of their ancestors, is not certain[190]. At any rate “we may grant that, now that labour had become so costly, the lords would insist on the exact performance of such labour dues as had not yet been commuted, and on the punctual payment of all money rents. There is much reason to believe, moreover, that they abused their power of imposing “amercements” on their tenants in the manor courts for trivial breaches of duty”[191]. This severe and unaccustomed pressure on the villeins, who were becoming comfortable copyholders, resulted in Wat Tyler’s revolt of 1381[192].
Nor were the labourers any longer allowed to dispose freely of their labour power. “While the plague was actually raging parliament could not meet, but a proclamation was at once issued by the king with the advice of certain prelates and nobles, of which the preamble states that, “many seeing the necessity of masters and great scarcity of servants will not serve unless they get excessive wages”, and that consequently the land can be scarcely tilled. Everyone, free or villan, who can work and has no other means of livelihood, is not to refuse to do so for anyone who offers the accustomed wages; each lord is to have the preference in hiring the men on his own estate, but none is to have too many men for his work; no labourer is to leave his employment before the specified time; nor to receive more rations or wages than he did in the twentieth year of the king and the common years before that; none are to give or take more wages in town or country”[193]. [[368]]
The depopulation of this time caused a reappearance of free land, i.e. of land which had practically no value, and so agricultural labourers were scarcely to be had. Therefore the lords to some extent reattached the cultivators to the soil.
These measures, however, were of little avail. It was not easy to prevent an employer from secretly giving more than the statutory wages. The penalties for infraction of the regulation were rendered more severe, the fines being replaced by imprisonment; yet the whole legislation proved a failure[194].
And even if the statutes of labourers had been everywhere enforced, “many landowners would have been left in a position of great difficulty; if there was no one to do the work it did not much matter what they were to be paid, and in not a few villages scarcely any one was left to carry on the ordinary agricultural operations.” Therefore new expedients had to be devised, of which the most general appears to have been the stock and land lease; “the new tenant took the land and the stock off the lord’s hands and made in return a definite annual payment.” These tenants “probably sprang from the class of free labourers, as the surviving villains who already had their own holdings, would not be so easily able to offer for a portion of the domain land which the lord desired to let”[195].
Here again we see the consequences of the abundance of land. The land alone could not fetch a reasonable price; stock and land had to be leased together.
As these leaseholders were taken from the labouring class, this measure, of course, still further diminished the supply of labour.
All these palliatives could not, indeed, better the position of the landlords to any considerable extent. They had to wait for an increase of population which would render to the land the value that it had before the Black Death. As, however, the plague recurred several times, the population appears to have scarcely increased[196].