20 ox THE AGRICULTUKE OF THE COUNTY OF SUTHERLAND, 



hens, £3, 18s. ; eggs, £1, 7s. 6d. ; servitude, £56, 10s. ; — making, 

 in all, £229, 6s. 4d." Mr Loch explains that KintradweU " had 

 been granted in wadset or mortgage for the sum of £800. In 

 1811 the wadsetter granted the residue of the term then un- 

 expired, being eight years, to the late sub-tenant, Mr Mac- 

 pherson, for a iine or grassum of £800, and the annual rent of 

 £150. The value of the land in Mr Macpherson's o^vn occupa- 

 tion amounted to £200 per annum, thus making the whole 

 income derived by him from the farm £429 per annum. In this 

 case there were three gradations between the landlord and the 

 occupier of the land ; in some instances, four." This obnoxious 

 system became less popular as the present century advanced, 

 the chiefs or landed proprietors found that they had more com- 

 plete control over their people if they were made their own 

 immediate tenants, and in many cases the proprietors remanded 

 the wadsets or mortgages, leaving vdth the farmers what they 

 had retained in their o^\m possessions, and letting the remainder 

 directly to the small tenants who weie formerly the sub-tenants. 

 Captain Henderson states, that about the year 1808, the rent of 

 the arable land on the south-east coast was from 15 s. to 21s. per 

 boll somng or acre, while, m some cases, 30s. or 35s. was 

 charged for pasture attached to the arable land. In the straths, 

 and on the western and northern coasts, rent was paid in 

 accordance witli the number of black cattle that could be reared 

 on the farm, and its amount per acre could not, therefore, be 

 ascertained. Wadset leases at one time freqiiently extended 

 over tw^o nmeteens, but after the commencement of the present 

 century, few of these were given. The duration of leases be- 

 tween the proprietors and principal tacksmen was generally nine- 

 teen or twenty-one years ; and between tacksmen and sub-tenants 

 (but leases between these were rare) three, five, or seven years. 

 The implements m general use at the commencement of the 

 present century were of the most primitive description. The 

 better-to-do farmers and proprietors had begun to use the 

 modern Scotch plough, which cost from £3 to £4, 10s., but the 

 small tenants still employ the old Scotch plough, made of birch 

 or alder, with a thin plate of hammered iron on the bottom and 

 land side of the head. " This plough," says Captain Henderson, 

 " exclusive of the ploughshare, and sock, and plates, costs from 

 5s. to 15s., and is often made by the tenant who uses it. In the 

 parishes of Assjmt, Eddrachilles, Durness, and Tongue, and in 

 other parts, the caschrom, a sort of spade, was in general use, 

 while the clumsy old-fashioned home-made wooden harrows 

 were worked by the smaller tenants all over the county, only 

 those farmers who had improved ploughs having had harrows 

 with iron teeth. On the larcjer farms there were a few of the 

 modern horse-carts, which cost then from £12 to £16, but 



