26 ON THE AGRICULTUKE OF 



Eute for about 7s. per ton ; short dung or aslies for about 3s. per 

 ton. If purchased in Eothesay long dung can be laid on the 

 fields for 6s. a ton, and the police manure is given to the farmers 

 for taking it away. 



Pasturage. 



The pasturage of Bute enjoys no great reputation, and purely 

 pastoral farms are very scarce. Within recent years the tenant 

 of Ehubodach, Kilmichael, and Bannatyne Mains, has maintained 

 the last named farm as a grazing farm by top dressing with short 

 dung and farmyard manure, mixed with lime and ground bones. 

 Ayrshires, Highland bullocks, shorthorns, Galloways, and 

 Canadian cattle are grazed on this farm, and fattened for the 

 markets. The only other grazing of any extent is around the 

 Mount Stuart policies, and it is let to farmers and others for graz- 

 ing young stock. 



Wages. 



As in the rest of Scotland so in Bute the cost of workiucj a farm 

 has almost doubled, in respect of wages, within the last twenty 

 years, and were it not that, with machinery in use for almost 

 every purpose, fewer hands are required, it is difficult to con- 

 ceive how farminoj could be carried on, rents also havin^^ increased 

 so much until recently. Married ploughmen in Bute at present 

 are receiving 18s. per week with a free house. Female servants, 

 good milkers and field workers, boarded in the house, are paid 

 from £8, 10s. to £9, and lads receive from £8 to £12, with board, 

 per half-year ; About twenty- five years ago the same class of 

 women servants were receiving about £3, 10s., and lads about £5 

 per half-year with board and lodgings. Female field-workers 

 employed thinning turnips in 1880 w^ere paid 2s. a-day without 

 rations, and the same workers in harvest time received 2s. a day 

 with rations. Men employed during harvest time received from 

 6d. to Is. a-day more than the women, with their rations, and 

 full w^ages whether the weather was wet or dry. The wages of 

 these workers in 1880 were just about double what they were 

 in the years from 1855 to 1860. 



Greater Cu.mbrae. 



Having thus exhausted our information regarding the agricul- 

 ture of Bute, a few particulars of the island of Cumbrae may 

 best be inserted here before proceeding to write of the agricul- 

 ture of Arran. Cumbrae has everything in common with Bute, 

 but little or nothing in common with Arran. The island lies 

 4 miles east of Bute, and 2 miles west of Largs, in Ayrshire. 

 It is 3J miles in length from north-east to south-west ; 



