The despatches and correspondence of John, second earl of Buckinghamshire, ambassador to the court of Catherine II, of Russia 1762-1765

There were horses and sheep and pigs and cattle and bees. There was tillage land and fallow land, meadow and pasture. БЂњAgain, sir, shal we sow the hade land with wheate?БЂ«a servant asks Justice Shallow in the second part of King Henry IV. БЂњWith red wheat, DauyБЂ«(Part Two, 2704-5). Shakespeare evidently understood the language of the land. In 1549 the Bishop of Worcester was obliged to cede his manorial rights over Stratford to John Dudley, Earl of Warwick; the town was in that sense secularised. In 1553 it was granted a charter whereby the erstwhile officers of the Guild of the Holy Cross became aldermen; fourteen townsmen were given this role, and out of their number a bailiff or mayor was to be elected. They in turn chose fourteen other БЂњburgesses,БЂ«and together they comprised the town council. They met in the old guildhall beside the chapel where their duties included the supervision of the bridge, the school and the chapel itself; the properties that once belonged to the guild were now used to garner income for the council ...»