7 a visitor described how Mrs. Prowse entertained the labourers and their families (some 60 people in all) at harvest time with music, large bowls of syllabub, bread, cheese and ale, helping to ensure that they remained the 'happiest set of peasants in England'. She also invited her family and 'select friends in the neighbourhood' to a fête champêtre in the park, which the country people were allowed to watch from beyond the ha-ha, before being invited in by her servants to finish off the food. (fn. 277)
Within twenty years of inclosure a new farm, Little Hill, was established on the former open fields between the Buckingham road and the river, and Mount Mill had been assigned a large acreage of new inclosures. (fn. 278) In 1768 Mrs. Prowse converted all the farms from 'written agreements' (apparently annual tenancies) to leases, losing only one tenant in the process. (fn. 279) The number of separate holdings, however, did not change greatly: in 1778 Mrs. Prowse noted that she had insured nine farmhouses, the maltster's house and kiln, two tiled houses, and 51 thatched cottages, (fn. 280) figures very similar to those of 1717 and 1738. (fn. 281)
The estate was producing about £1,000- £1,100 in rent in the last quarter of the 18th century, from which Mrs. Prowse normally drew around £800 a year for repairs and domestic expenses, including the cost of the school. (fn. 282) One of the farms was kept in hand, although Mrs. Prowse charged herself a notional rent for the holding and carefully accounted for other expenses and income there. (fn. 283) The eight let farms were yielding about £1,250 gross in 1797, when a new survey suggested that advances of around 20 per cent could be achieved on re-letting. The farms, which all had their land in reasonably compact blocks around the house and buildings, ranged from 102 a. to 363 a. around a mean of 200 a., with considerable variation in the proportion of arable and grass between different holdings. Two had between 40 and 45 per cent of their land under the plough; on two m