[E118] Dr. Mavor suggests that as Tusser is pretty correct in his rhymes, he probably wrote beasty originally. In Pegge's Forme of Cury, 1780, p. 111, are given two recipes for the prevention of Restyng in Venisoun.
[E119] "Stouer." Stover is the term now applied to the coarser hay made of clover and artificial grasses, which is kept for the winter feed of cattle. But in Shakespeare's time the artificial grasses were not known in England, and were not introduced till about the middle of the seventeenth century. In Cambridgeshire I am informed that hay made in this manner is not called "stover" till the seeds have been threshed out. In the sixteenth century the word was apparently used to denote any kind of winter fodder except grass hay. Compare
"Thy turfy mountains, where live nibbling sheep,
And flat meads thatch'd with stover, them to keep."
—Shakspere, Tempest, Act iv. sc. I;
and Drayton, Polyolbion, xxv. 145,
"And others from their Carres, are busily about,
To draw out Sedge and Reed, for Thatch and Stover fit."
"Stover" is enumerated by Ray among the South-and East-Country words as used in Essex, and is to be found in Moor's Suffolk Words and Forby's Vocabulary of East Anglia.
[E121] In cleaning corn for seed, casting or throwing it with a casting shovel (see [17. 1]) from one heap to another, in order to select the heaviest grains, which will always go farthest, is an excellent practice: but in malting, this is not necessary, as the light grains and seeds of weeds may be skimmed off in the cistern.—M.
[E122] Wheat is well known to work better in grinding and baking after it has undergone a natural heat in the rick or mow. Wheat that is threshed early keeps with difficulty.—M.
[E123] "Rauening curres" seem to have been as great a nuisance in Tusser's time as at present, in spite of what Dr. Mavor terms one of the "few patriotic taxes which we have to boast of."