180 ON THE AGRICULTURE OF THE 



rental at the rate of about 7s. 6d. per acre, it is difficult to 

 iraagine how land worth only 15s. or 17s. of rent per acre can 

 possibly repay regular cultivation. Of land of this description 

 there are many thousands of acres in the northern counties of 

 Scotland that are at present worked in regular rotation, but we 

 should not be in the least surprised though a large portion of this 

 should be laid out in permanent pasture in the course of the 

 next eight or ten years. Under pasture very thin land may pay 

 fairly, but under regular rotation, and so long as the present 

 circumstances continue, we cannot conceive how any man can 

 make a living u^Don it for any length of time. The area under 

 permanent pasture in Eoss and Cromarty has increased by about 

 2000 acres during the past eight or [ten years, and there is every 

 probability of the increase going on still further. The area under 

 permanent pasture at the present time is 19,395 acres. 



Boot Crops. 



Turnips. — The following table shows the number of acres 

 under turnips at various periods since 1854 : — 



1854, . . , 10,467 acres. 1871, . . . 16,770 acres. 



1857, . . . 12,228 ., 1873, . . . 16,902 „ 



1869, . . . 16,735 ,, , 1876, . . . 17,126 „ 



Increase since 1854, .... 6,659 acres. 



• 



In 1854 Eoss and Cromarty stood seventeenth among the 

 Scotch counties with regard to the acreage under turnips, and 

 now they stand as high up as tenth. Turnips are indispensable 

 where cattle feeding is carried on to any great extent, and it is 

 the extraordinary development of this branch of agriculture in 

 Eoss and Cromarty that has swelled the acreage of turnips so 

 greatly. For some time back at least, stock farms have been 

 paying better than grain farms, and so long as this continues to 

 be the case turnips will continue to grow in favour. Over the 

 north of Scotland generally the turnip crop is now one of the most 

 valuable in the rotation, and therefore a great deal of attention is 

 bestowed on its cultivation. Turnips entail a great amount of 

 labour, but still this is neither grudged nor bestowed carelessly. 

 Twenty-five or thirty years ago swedes were little more than in 

 their probationary trial in Eoss and Cromarty, and even on the 

 larger farms in Easter Eoss it was considered extravagant to sow 

 more than 10 or 12 acres of swedes. In the year 1848 the late 

 Mr Douglas sowed 75 acres of turnips on his farm of Arboll, in 

 the parish of Tarbat, and with the exception of 5 acres of swedes 

 for the farm horses, the whole were soft varieties. Part of the 

 crop was eaten off by sheep at a charge of 2d. a head per week. 

 Now nearly three-fourths of the whole turnip area on the heavier 

 soils in Easter Eoss are put under swedes, and on the lighter soils 

 the proportion of swedes to other varieties is about half and half. 



