166 REPORT ON THE AGRICULTURE OF PERTHSHIRE. 



to these disadvantages the present high and increasing price of 

 labour, it is impossible to resist the conclusion that these high 

 lands cannot long be kept in cultivation, and yield a rent to the 

 proprietor and living to the tenant such as can be realised from 

 them if properly laid down to pasture ; and that some such re- 

 appropriation of this class of small farms is inevitable at no dis- 

 tant time, the outlay in buildings for arable culture notwith- 

 standing, seems more than probable. This has taken place 

 during the last fifty years in some parts of the south of Scotland, 

 where the holdings were more moorland farms under mixed 

 husbandry than large stock farms. The traces of cultivation on 

 the hill sides, and the ruins of old crofter huts and hamlets, now 

 numbered among the things that were, are still observable in 

 many parts of these southern uplands. All agriculture in the 

 present day on high altitudes must be regarded as only a means 

 to an end, that end being grass ; and when the end is attained, 

 sheep must take the place of men, women, and horses, since it is 

 found that their labours can be turned to better account in 

 localities at a lower level. Land of this sort, if laid down to 

 grass, with no annual expense in its management but the wages 

 of a shepherd, may pay rent to the landlord and a profit to 

 the tenant ; but if kept under the plough, there can be no pro- 

 spect of great profit, even in favourable seasons, and a chance of 

 there being little beyond payment of expenses in unpropitious 

 years. 



With regard to the large grazings in the Highlands and moun- 

 tains of Perthshire, much improvement has taken place, both in 

 the lands themselves and the stock that is produced on them. 

 A great extent of surface drainage has been executed, with the 

 sure result of improving the quality and soundness of the pasture, 

 and thereby the stock fed upon it. With the exception of the 

 winters 1859-60 and 1864-65, the recent seasons have generally 

 been of a mild character, and favourable for the sheep stocks ; 

 but in occasional years, such as 1859, the hill graziers have suf- 

 fered heavy losses from deaths of stock and the expense of sup- 

 plying food at high prices to the survivors, having no preparation 

 for such contingencies within themselves. They might protect 

 themselves in many cases from such disasters by forming water 

 meadows on suitable spots on their farms, and raising yearly a 

 crop of hay, which, if not required in open seasons, would accumu- 

 late for those in which it was needed. There is not a water 

 meadow in Perthshire except a small one at Glendevon ; but 

 those who wish to see them, and learn the advantage derived 

 from them, will find them in Peeblesshire and the upper ward 

 of Lanarkshire, in a higher and colder climate than most of the 

 grazing lands of Perthshire. 



Where ewe stocks are kept the blackfaced breed are still 



