Thus in December 1630 in four of the hundreds of Essex arrangements were made for supplying the people with corn at home. The chief inhabitants "of theire owne accords" laid in a store for the poor allowing 7d., 18d. or 2s. the bushel and giving an equivalent amount in money to those that did not bake their own bread[444]. Next month we hear that this plan had been adopted in most of the shire; every parish had its store and the poor were served at 18d. and 2s. a bushel under the usual price. Sometimes when grain was scarce, bread and money were given instead. Our informant states that this provision of corn for the poor at cheap rates had had a considerable effect in lowering the price of grain[445]. From every hundred of Norfolk a report of the state of the corn supply of the poor was received, and some arrangement of this kind is usually reported. In some hundreds two degrees of poverty were recognised. The very poor only paid half-a-crown a bushel for their barley, but "the labourers yt had nott so much neede" were served at three shillings[446].
This plan does not seem to have been general in Yorkshire, but it was adopted by at least eight hundreds[447]. There are moreover many examples of stores of this kind in Hertfordshire and some in every Eastern county except Northumberland and Lincolnshire[448]. The fact that special mention is made of poor labourers shows that relief was not confined to the disabled or to paupers. It was given in the eastern counties more than in the western probably because the scarcity was more felt in the east and the poor were in greater distress[449].
d. Other special methods of providing food for the poor.
Sometimes other plans were adopted. The owners and dealers of corn were expected to contribute to the need of their less fortunate neighbours. At Reading the corn masters set apart a sack in every load to serve for the poor at twelvepence a bushel under the market rate[450]. It would seem that some allowance was usually made by dealers in corn, for another dealer who was a victim of a riot at Woodchurch states that out of ten quarters he left five to be sold to the poor[451].
Other expedients of this kind were adopted; in Devonshire the children of the poor were billetted on those able to give relief[452], and at Maidstone the town baked the bread and gave loaves to the day labourers and poorest inhabitants[453]. Three of the hundreds of Cambridgeshire tried a still more organised plan: "the poorer sort had weekly corne delivered to them at home at twelvepence in the bushell in the least under the market prices[454]."
2. Evidence as to success or failure of the corn regulations.
We have very varied opinions as to the success or failure of the organisation for supplying the poor with corn. The justices in several instances state that the search raised prices, and ask that a second search may not be made[455]. In a few cases they say the regulation of the markets was injurious. The most decided of these is an account from Edwinstree and Odsey, "And we humbly conceaue that or strickt lookeing to the marketts by orselves and others, very sufficient and diligent supervisors, whom we haue imploied wth a great deale of care in these businesses is an occacion that the marketts are the smaller, the corne dearer and new shifts and devises are found out[456]." In the autumn of 1631 inquiries as to the cause of the scarcity were instituted, and the Bridport authorities candidly replied that it was owing to the interference of the justices[457]. But perhaps the most interesting protest is that from Chipping Wycombe. It was a town on the borders of Buckinghamshire, which was largely inhabited by dealers in corn and was the market for the neighbouring parts of Oxfordshire and Berkshire. After the instructions of the Privy Council had been followed, only a quarter of the usual quantity was brought to the market. The dealers, the Mayor tells us, lost heavily because the price of meal had been fixed by the Lord Mayor, and both they and the farmers were disgusted at the lowering of prices in other parts of the country. Formerly the badgers had set aside sacks for the poor, and the farmers and others had provided stores for them. This they now refused to do, but the justices did their best and themselves sold to the poor under the market rates[458]. The dislike of the orders is very apparent in this report, but it bears witness to the fact that they were sometimes successful, since prices had been lowered in consequence in other parts of the country. But as Chipping Wycombe was inhabited largely by corn-dealers, and as it drew its supplies from other counties, the orders failed there, and the fact that Chipping Wycombe was such a town may have been not without its influence on the making of history, for John Hampden, we are told, was one of the justices present who witnessed the distress of this disastrous market-day. It was not a position in which he would judge favourably of the effects of governmental interference.
Still the balance of evidence is in favour of the orders. When they were first put in force they seem to have had a considerable effect in lowering the price. Many of the reports sent in during the last half of December and beginning of January tell us that this was the case[459], though after the beginning of the year prices again rose, because the corn was wanted for seed as well as for food. However even as late as April 30th a report from the district of Horncastle in Lincolnshire informs us that the writers have ordered the markets to be furnished every week with a particular quantity, and that the price of oatmeal, which was the chief food of the poor in that part of the country, had been lowered from eight groats to one shilling and tenpence[460].
There are other statements of the same kind[461], but one of the most strongly expressed of these is from the justices of Suffolk, "We giue yr lo(rdshi)ps many humble thanks for your great fauours shewed unto vs and to the whole state of this county in these necessiteouse times by those most prudent, compassionate and charitable considerations deliuered in your bookes of directions and sent vnto vs wch we haue wth our uttermost endeauours laboured in euery parte to see accomplished as well by orselues as others. And we must acknowledge with or and the countryes great thankfulnesse unto yr lo(rdshi)ps that ye benefit wch hereof hath arisen hath bine beyonde all expectation inestemable and of wonderful effect[462]."
But the strongest argument that on the whole these measures were beneficial is to be found in the fact that they were enforced throughout the country by the justices with very few protests. The justices would as a rule be landlords and generally corn owners; the regulations were against their interests, and, unless they had thought that they contributed to the public welfare, they would have complained more and performed less. When they thought a course objectionable they said so: many of them did not approve of a second search of the stocks of corn[463]; in several instances they said that the order to prevent millers from buying corn was not beneficial, because the millers sold in small quantities to the poor who did not come to market[464]. But the rest of the orders concerning corn were enforced nearly always without comment or with approval.