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Jean Froissart, Thomas Malory, Raphael Holinshed

"Chronicle and Romance (The Harvard Classics Series)"

Our cart or plough horses (for we use them
indifferently) are commonly so strong that five or six of them (at the
most) will draw three thousand weight of the greatest tale with ease
for a long journey, although it be not a load of common usage, which
consisteth only of two thousand, or fifty foot of timber, forty
bushels of white salt, or six-and-thirty of bay, of five quarters of
wheat, experience daily teacheth, and I have elsewhere remembered.
Such as are kept also for burden will carry four hundredweight
commonly without any hurt or hindrance. This furthermore is to be
noted, that our princes and the nobility have their carriage commonly
made by carts, whereby it cometh to pass that when the queen's majesty
doth remove from any one place to another, there are usually 400
carewares, which amount to the sum of 2400 horses, appointed out of
the countries adjoining, whereby her carriage is conveyed safely unto
the appointed place. Hereby also the ancient use of somers and sumpter
horses is in manner utterly relinquished, which causeth the trains of
our princes in their progresses to shew far less than those of the
kings of other nations.


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