192 ON THE AGEICULTUEE OF THE 



remainder of the cattle fed at Balmiicliy range from 6 to 9 cwt. 

 in weight. 



At the farms of CadboU and Cadboll Mount, Mr James Young 

 feeds annually about 160 very fine cattle, all for the southern 

 markets, and pursues a system of buying and feeding similar in 

 the main to that followed by Mr Gordon. Mr Young selects his 

 cattle with great care and taste, and his consignments to the 

 Smithfield market are equalled by very few from north of the 

 Tweed. 



SJieep Farming. 



Prominent as is the position that Easter Eoss has won for 

 the county in an arable-farming point of view, Wester Eoss 

 has gained it quite as good a name by the advanced system 

 of sheep-farming pursued among its hills and glens. Not 

 only is sheep-farming carried on very extensively in Eoss and 

 Cromarty, but the system of management pursued by the flock- 

 owners will bear favourable comparison with that obtaining in 

 any part of the kingdom. The class of sheep, too, is very excel- 

 lent ; and though bigger-boned animals may be reared on the 

 green-mantled hills in the south of Scotland, more kindly feeding 

 sheep are not to be found anywhere. They are well bred, care- 

 fully tended in their youth, and fed with no niggard hand, neither 

 in summer nor winter. These seemingly high-sounding words 

 will probably be appreciated all the more, when it is mentioned 

 that about a hundred years ago sheep-farming, in the'trae sense 

 of the term, was as little known in Eoss-shire as coffee-planting 

 at the present day. It has already been mentioned that Sir John 

 Lockhart Eoss of Balnagown was the first to introduce sheep- 

 farming into Eoss-shire, and that amidst strong opposition among 

 the natives, amounting even to open revolt, he succeeded in laying 

 a most substantial foundation for a most extensive and highly 

 remunerative branch of rural industry — a branch hitherto entirely 

 unknown in the north of Scotland. For seven years he was the 

 only sheep-farmer in the county of Eoss, if not indeed in the 

 whole range of country north of Aberdeen. In 1781 he gave up 

 his farm to a Mr Geddes from Perthshire, who in the face of 

 great opposition from the natives laboured diligently in the good 

 work for many years. At last he succeeded very well, and after 

 his death his son renewed his lease and rented some adjoining 

 lands. Between 1781 and 1790 other three gentlemen began 

 operations as sheep-farmers in Eoss and Cromarty on an exten- 

 sive scale, viz., a Mr Cameron from Port William, who took a 

 hill farm on Mr Munro's estate of Culcairn ; a Mr Mitchell from 

 Ayrshire, who rented a large tract of pasture land on the Tulloch 

 property, and Mr Macleod of Geanies, who leased a large extent 

 of pasture land among the hills on the west coast. Mr Cameron 



