DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22140#0064
48 INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL HISTORY.
sented in Parliament, were not taxed by Parliament. The account
of the proceeds gives the number of those liable to the tax in
forty-two towns. Now if we add a third to the number of those
assessed, in order to include the children under fourteen, a very
liberal calculation for childhood in the Middle Ages, when the
risks of life were far greater, we get 168,720 for the population of
the forty-two towns, and 1,207,722 for the other thirty-eight
English counties. Durham and Chester may be taken at 51,083,
Wales with Monmouth at 131,040. Now add one-third to the
country population and you get 1,853,127, or with the town popu-
lation 2,021,847. There still remain the ecclesiastics and the
mendicants. Take them at 162,153, and the population comes
out at 2,184,000, or less than two and a quarter millions.
But I cannot yet relieve you of the figures in this instructive
return. The largest town of course is London. Perhaps it was
healthier than it was in the seventeenth century, when the deaths
greatly exceeded the births. With a third added to its taxable
population, it had 35,000 inhabitants. The next city is York,
with near 11,000. Bristol has about 9,500, Coventry a little
above 7,000, Norwich near 6,000, Lincoln about 5,000. No other
English town had over 5,000 inhabitants, though thirty-six more
are separately assessed, and returned. In Bedford, Surrey, Dorset,
Westmoreland, Rutland, Cornwall, Berks, Hunts, Bucks, and
Lancashire, no town whatever was thought worthy of a separate
return, though they sent many members to the Parliament which
granted the tax. England at this time, and for many a year after
this date, was essentially rural, and not a little of its economical
history is bound up and derived from the country life, which its
inhabitants lived for centuries. Besides, though England possessed
fortresses and walled towns up to the civil war of the seventeenth
century, these were not constructed on scientific lines. There was
not an English town which had been protected by such engineer-
ing defences as were erected in plenty in Holland, Flanders, and
the eastern frontier of France. It would seem from several Acts
of Parliament that many towns were falling into decay during
the reign of Henry VIII., a fact which has elicited some very
grotesque reasoning from Mr. Froude, in his sketch of his patriot
king.
sented in Parliament, were not taxed by Parliament. The account
of the proceeds gives the number of those liable to the tax in
forty-two towns. Now if we add a third to the number of those
assessed, in order to include the children under fourteen, a very
liberal calculation for childhood in the Middle Ages, when the
risks of life were far greater, we get 168,720 for the population of
the forty-two towns, and 1,207,722 for the other thirty-eight
English counties. Durham and Chester may be taken at 51,083,
Wales with Monmouth at 131,040. Now add one-third to the
country population and you get 1,853,127, or with the town popu-
lation 2,021,847. There still remain the ecclesiastics and the
mendicants. Take them at 162,153, and the population comes
out at 2,184,000, or less than two and a quarter millions.
But I cannot yet relieve you of the figures in this instructive
return. The largest town of course is London. Perhaps it was
healthier than it was in the seventeenth century, when the deaths
greatly exceeded the births. With a third added to its taxable
population, it had 35,000 inhabitants. The next city is York,
with near 11,000. Bristol has about 9,500, Coventry a little
above 7,000, Norwich near 6,000, Lincoln about 5,000. No other
English town had over 5,000 inhabitants, though thirty-six more
are separately assessed, and returned. In Bedford, Surrey, Dorset,
Westmoreland, Rutland, Cornwall, Berks, Hunts, Bucks, and
Lancashire, no town whatever was thought worthy of a separate
return, though they sent many members to the Parliament which
granted the tax. England at this time, and for many a year after
this date, was essentially rural, and not a little of its economical
history is bound up and derived from the country life, which its
inhabitants lived for centuries. Besides, though England possessed
fortresses and walled towns up to the civil war of the seventeenth
century, these were not constructed on scientific lines. There was
not an English town which had been protected by such engineer-
ing defences as were erected in plenty in Holland, Flanders, and
the eastern frontier of France. It would seem from several Acts
of Parliament that many towns were falling into decay during
the reign of Henry VIII., a fact which has elicited some very
grotesque reasoning from Mr. Froude, in his sketch of his patriot
king.