REPORT ON THE AGRICULTURE OF DUMFRIESSHIRE. 287 



years is now the more common length, while in a few instances 

 eighteen or nineteen years is the period adopted. It appears to 

 the reporter that this shortening of leases is much to be regretted. 

 When the farms are wrought on a five years' "shift," the farmer has 

 three courses of rotation during the currency of a lease of fifteen 

 years' duration ; but when the rotation is a six years' one, he is 

 enabled to go only twice over a part of it. Thus the same en- 

 couragement for improvement is not given as would be the case 

 were the leases to extend over a longer period. This is especially 

 true of farms which through any cause happen to be in poor 

 condition at the time when the tenants enter upon them. If the 

 tenant is enterprising and liberal in his management, he must 

 sink a good deal of capital during the course of his first rotation. 

 It is only at the end of that time that he begins to reap the 

 benefit of his outlaid capital, and a comparatively limited period 

 remains during which he has an opportunity of reaping it. We 

 apprehend, therefore, that short leases, even when they extend 

 to fifteen years, operate as a check to improvement. They are 

 practically lengthened on some estates, however, by the occu- 

 pants being offered a new lease a year or two before the former 

 one expires. Such a system not only prevents the farmer from 

 impoverishing his land at the end of his lease, but further en- 

 ables him to resume his improvements with increased liberality 

 and vigour. It will scarcely be necessary to add that these 

 remarks are not meant to refer to sheep farms, for a long lease 

 is not so important in their case as in that of strictly arable farms. 



3. Kinds of Entries. — There are three principal kinds of 

 entries common in Dumfriesshire, the nature of which we shall 

 now explain, afterwards pointing out the respective advantages 

 and disadvantages of each. The first of these is what is usually 

 called the Candlemas entry. In this case the tenant enters upon 

 the land which falls to be in crop at Candlemas, and he gets 

 possession of the house and grass lands at Whitsunday. He is 

 usually called upon to pay his first half-year's rent about January 

 or February. 



Then, secondly, there is the Whitsunday entry, under which, 

 the tenant gets possession of the whole farm at that term, with 

 the exception of that part of it which is under grain crops. The 

 tenant usually pays for the grass and clover seeds sown during 

 the preceding year, if they were not pastured after the cutting 

 of the grain crops in autumn. He either provides the seeds to 

 be sown along with the grain crop which belongs to the outgoing 

 tenant, or pays for them at valuation. It is not uncommon to 

 bind the outgoing tenant to offer to hand over the whole or a 

 part of the growing (white) crop to the incoming tenant, at a 

 valuation fixed by persons mutually chosen, and in the event of 

 his offer not being accepted on these terms, he has liberty to sell 



