26 ON THE AGRICULTUKE OF THE COUNTY OF SUTHERLAND, 



service or local roads made, and other improvements effected, so 

 that by 1830 the face of the country had become wonderfully 

 changed. The late Mr Patrick Sellar, who visited Sutherland 

 along with other Morayshire men in 1809, and found it entirely 

 devoid of roads, harbours, farm steadings (excepting one or two), 

 or any other signs of modern agriculture, wrote as follows, in 

 1820, to Mr James Loch, commissioner on the Sutherland 

 property :—" At this time (1809) nothing could have led me to 

 believe that in the short space of ten years I should see, in such 

 a country, roads made in every direction ; the mail coach daily 

 driving through it, new harbours built, in one of which upwards 

 of twenty vessels have been repeatedly seen at one time taking 

 in cargoes for exportation, coal and salt and lime and brick-works 

 established, farm steadings everywhere built, fields laid off and 

 substantially enclosed, capital horses employed, with south 

 country miplements of husbandry, made in Sutherland, tilling 

 the ground, secundum artcrii for turnips, wheat, and artificial 

 grasses; an export of fish, wool, and mutton to the extent of 

 £70,000 a year ; the women dressed out from Manchester, Glas- 

 gow, and Paisley ; the English language made the language of 

 the county ; and a baker, a carpenter, a blacksmith, mason, shoe- 

 maker, &c., to be had as readily and nearly as cheap, too, as in 

 other counties." About 1809 Mr Sellar entered on a lease of the 

 farm of Culmaily, in the valley of Golspie, and about a mile from 

 that town, at a rent of 25s. per acre, with an advance at 6^ 

 per cent, of £1500 to assist in improvements, the extent of the 

 farm being 300 Scotch acres. This enterprising gentleman at 

 once set to work, and in a few years had the whole of the farm 

 reclaimed, a considerable portion of it from moor and moss and 

 rough pasture, — had erected upon it an excellent dwelling-house, 

 farm steading, and thrashing mill, — and had it brought to a high 

 state of cultivation. He also took on lease the adjoining farm of 

 Morvich, and between the two he had reclaimed over 250 acres 

 before 1820. On the neighbouring farms of Kirkton, Drumroy, 

 and Dunrobin Mains, and at Crakaig and Skelbo, similar unprove- 

 ments were executed about the same time; while at different 

 parts along the south-eastern coast smaller reclamations and im- 

 provements were carried out, partly by the tenants and partly by 

 the proprietors. 



The want of reliable statistics makes it impossible to give even 

 an approximate idea of the number of acres of land reclaimed in 

 the county during any given period of the first half of the present 

 century. It has already been stated that in 1808 the arable area 

 was estimated at 14,500 Scotch acres, or about 18,125 imperial 

 acres, but, through the removal of the small tenants from the 

 straths in the interior during the second decade of the present 

 century, and the turning of their crofts into sheep pasture, that 



