COUNTIES OF EOSS AND CEOMAETY. 93 



improvement of the agriculture of Eoss and Cromarty may "be 

 mentioned Mr Mackenzie of Allan Grange, Captain Munro of 

 Teanich, Mr Eose of Glastulich, Mr Cockburn Eoss of Shand- 

 wick, Mr Mackenzie of Hilton, Sir Hector Munro of iSTovar, Mr 

 Macleod of Geanies, Lord Seaforth, Major F. Mackenzie of Fod- 

 derty, Mr Mackay of Eockfield, Mr Eeid of Kinnairdy, the Eev. 

 Mr Mackenzie of Fodderty, Mr Archibald Dudgeon (a native of 

 East Lothian), and Captain Eose of Bindhill. 



Progress of the Past Twenty-five Years, 



Probably the second twenty-five years of the present century 

 saw quite as much improvement effected in the counties of Eoss 

 and Cromarty as the past twenty years have seen — much, indeed, 

 as that has been. As already hinted, the spirit of improvement 

 began to dawn about the advent of the nineteenth century, and 

 by the end of the first quarter a wonderful amount had been 

 accomplished; in fact, by 1825, the better favoured parts of the 

 counties could boast of agriculture of the highest description. A 

 faint idea will be had of what condition some of the better farms 

 were in about that time, when it is mentioned that at a sale 

 which the late Mr Dudgeon had at his farm of Arboll in 1824, 

 he obtained L.84 for an entire horse, L.52, 10s. for a son of that 

 horse, L.o2, 10s. for a saddle mare, L.25 for a Highland fat cow, 

 L,50 for one Highland bull, and L.40 for another; while he 

 refused L.lOU for a riding pony, and L.75 for a six-year-old ox 

 that had been feeding for three years. Wheat was unknown at 

 the beginning of the century, and by 1825, or thereby, it had 

 become the staple product of several districts. Advanced, how- 

 ever, as the as'riculture was in these times on a few of the finer 

 farms, there was still much room for improvement throughout the 

 counties generally, and it was during the next twenty-five or 

 thirty years that the rouglier and probably the larger part of that 

 much-needed improvement was effected. While in its idrgin 

 state the land, or at least the main portion of it, was wet and 

 swampy, and before it could be cultivated with profit it had to 

 be thoroughly drained, and many hundreds of acres of it trenched 

 at a cost per acre of from L.10 to L.20, and in some cases even 

 L.25 ; and, in addition to all this, a complete new set of houses 

 had to be built, roads had to be made, fences erected, and other 

 odds and ends carried out, so that the cost of early improvements 

 in Eoss and Cromarty was indeed veiy high. The landlords and 

 tenants, liowever, were fully aware of the natural richness of their 

 country, and undaunted by the immense outlay, they laboured 

 on industriously until they had accomplislied their end — the rais- 

 ing of Eoss and Cromarty to a prominent position among the best 

 cultivated counties in the kin<'dom. Some of them mav have 

 lost money by their laudable exertions; but if such was the case, 



