36o 



The Country Gentleman's Magazine 



flowers is laid out with great taste, and is now 

 in splendid bloom. Roses and other trees 

 are budded for sale. The second crops of 

 vegetables after potatoes are not strong, but 

 very clean. The liquid manure is made 

 available, and we are glad to find at this 

 cottage, and every one we inspected, that a 

 good fat pig or two was kept. Johnson is 



the only claimant for this prize, but we think 

 him well entitled to it. — Inspected August 

 22, 1872." 



In accordance with the recommendation 

 contained in the report, the committee re- 

 solved to award silver medals to Messrs 

 Lowe «& Jephson, the farmers to whom re- 

 ference was made. 



IMPROVEMENT OF WASTE LAND IN SUTHERLANDSHIRE. 



A 



N Occasional Correspondent " of the 

 Times furnishes a very interesting 

 account of improvements m.ade and still 

 further to be extended on the waste lands of 

 this northern county. The Duke of Suther- 

 land is taking great interest in the matter. 

 His steam plough and harrows are working 

 wonders ; indeed, but for the powerful aid 

 of steam, little or nothing could have been 

 accomplished. The correspondent writes : — 



The county of Sutherland has a seaboard 

 on the south-east of 32 miles, and on the 

 north-west coast of 57 miles, while the breadth 

 from east to west is 52 miles, with the county 

 of Caithness between it and the Pentland 

 Firth on the one hand, and the county of 

 Ross between it and the Friths of Tain and 

 Uingwall on the other. It contains nearly 

 3000 square miles, or 1,872,000 acres, of 

 which, at the time of the survey in 1807 only 

 18,000 were arable, 35,000 in green pasture, 

 1,571,000 in mountain and moor, 61,000 in 

 salt and fresh water lakes, while 176,000 were 

 in peat moss and other waste lands, then 

 deemed to be wholly unimprovable. 



Soon after the survey was made, an ex- 

 perienced agriculturist, who had been em- 

 ployed by the Marquis and Marchioness of 

 Stafford to examine the property and give his 

 opinion as to its capabiUty for improvement, 

 said, in his report : — " Of all the counties in 

 the north of Inverness, the eastern hah" of 

 Caithness and Ross-shire being excepted, 

 Sutherland appears to me the most capable 

 of improvement. The summits of its hills 



may be improved by being planted with 

 larches; its valleys by the plough. There 

 is an immense tract of land, bounded by 

 Loch Shin on the west, and extending to 

 the eastern extremity of the county, of great 

 breadth, and almost flat, capable, in my 

 opinion, of carrying barley, turnips, potatoes, 

 and sown grasses, but now covered with 

 heath, and devoted to summer coarse-pasture 

 of a few miserable cattle." On the strength 

 of this report extensive improvements were 

 projected. Intelligent farmers from Moray- 

 shire were induced to settle on the more 

 improvable lands, while Earl Gower cul- 

 tivated two farms himself, and such were the 

 results that, in the next survey which was 

 published, the President of the Board of 

 Trade was informed " that the face of the 

 county was wonderfully changed ; " that 

 " threshing and meal mills had been erected;" 

 "neat stone cottages built " for the smaller 

 and poorer tenants, while a great breadth 

 was added in succeeding years to the arable 

 land of the county. 



But the 180,000 acres of moss and heavy 

 clay lands, difficult to work with much hill- 

 side ground which could not be reached by 

 ordinary modes of culture, were nearly un- 

 touched. And here it is that the Duke's 

 experiments begin. Let us visit the district 

 and examine one of them. Leaving the vil- 

 lage of Brosa on the sea-coast, with its coal- 

 fields in the rear, we drive up an accom- 

 modation road through the strath for two or 

 three miles until we reach a large tract of 



