young’s TRAVELS IN FRANCE.

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Sect. III.’—Of Tithe and Church Lands.

Piedmont. —Throughout this principality tithe is an object of no account. I madeInquiries concerning it every where : the greateft part of the lands pay none ; and uponthe reft it is fo light, as not to amount to more than from a twentieth to a fiftieth of theproduce *.

Milanese. —In the country from Milan to Pavia, no tithe of any kind, but the{urees are fupported by foundations. In the village where I made inquiries' into thedairy management,—the curee has 21 far a of rice, 12 fara of rye, 4 fara of wheat;three hundred pounds of the bed hay from one large farm; and he has fome other littlefiipends in nature ; the amount fmall, and never paid as a tithe.

At Mozzata, the tithes, as every where elfe, are fo low as to be no object; grain pays,but not on all land ; it is confined to the lands antiently in culture f, for even the ancef-tors of thefe people were much too wife, to allow the church to tax them in fuch a fpirit,as to take tithes of new improvements. Never did fuch a tneafure enter their heads orhearts ! The titheable lands are fmall diftri&s; are near to the villages that have been incultivation many centuries ; and in fome of thefe, tithe is not taken on all forts of corn;only on thofe forts antiently cultivated. The variations in this refpedl are many; butbut on whatever it is taken, it never exceeds a fixteenth, ufually from one-feventeenthto one-twentieth ; and of fuch as are levied, the whole does not belong to the curee, notmore perhaps than one-fourth; one-half to the canons of fome diftant church, to whichthe whole probably once belonged ; and one-fourth fold off to fome lay-lord, with a fti-pulation to repair the church. The variations are fo great, that no general rule holds;but they are every where fo light, that no complaints are heard of them.

The church lands feized by the late Emperor in the Milanefe, wereof immenfe value.From Pavia to Plaifance, all was in the hands of the monks ; and the Count de Belgiofohas hired thirty-fix dairy farms of the Emperor , by which he makes a profit of 50,000livres a year. The revenue that was feized, in the city of Milan only, amounted toabove 5,000,000 livres; and they fay in that city, that in the whole Auftrian monarchy,it amounted to 20,000,000 florins.

At Codogpo, and through moft of the Lodizan, tithe is fo very inconfiderable, thatit is not worth mentioning; the expreflion of the gentlemen who were my informants.

State of Venice. —In the diftrid of Verona, mulberries pay no tithe; wheat one-twelfth in fome places, in others lefs ; maize, millet, &c. from one-fifteenth to one-thirtieth ; but if for forage ohly, they pay none, no more than vetches, chick-peafe,millet, he. as it appears by a late memoir printed at Venice J. Meadows pay a lighttithe, becaufe they are taxed to find hay for the cavalry at an under price. In the dif-trift of Vicenza , tithe varies from the one-tenth to the forty-firft. About Padua, wheatalone pays the tenth : vines a trifle, at the will of the farmer : mulberries, fheep, andcows, nothing. *

Ecclesiastical State. — Bologna. —Tithes are fo low' throughout all the Bolog-nefe, that I could get no fatisfa&ory account of the very fmall payments that are yet

* Tithe in Sardinia is heavy. They pay one.tenth of the corn, and one-ninth of that one tenth forthrefhing, and one-fifth of the one-tenth for carriage.— Rlfiorimente della Sardegna, tom. i. p. 146.

-j- A remarkable paffage in Cjiulini deferves noting here ; under the year 1147, he gives fnalmentef pro-hil'/ce a ciajcheduno efftgere le decima dai terreni di nuovo coltivati, tom. v. p. 459.

J Raccolto di Memorie Delle Pubbliche Accademie, 8vo. 1789, tom. i. p. *JJ.

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