The Kindly Tenants. 81 



among their writings with such names as John Outbye, Will 

 Inbye, White-fish, Red-fish. . . . Their lands are, in general, 

 neatly enclosed and well cultivated, and they form a contented 

 and industrious little community." What Sir Walter Scott here 

 says of the sequestered state of the kindly tenants and their 

 strange distinctive names is very much a thing of the past. At 

 the beginning of the century handloom weaving was largely the 

 occupation of the people, and it suited very well the possessor of 

 a small piece of land, for in the intervals between one web and 

 another, the plot could be cultivated, but machinery has put an 

 end to handloom weaving, and railways and the increasing 

 attractions of great cities have drawn away not a few of the once 

 kindly tenants, and their portions have been readily bought at 

 the market value by one or other of the surrounding landed 

 proprietors, and Hightae and Greenhill and Smallholm are now 

 much smaller villages than they were in the beginning of the 

 century, when Sir Walter Scott wrote. 



In closing I must not omit to notice a privilege of the kindlie 

 tenants —the ease with which their portions may pass from one 

 to another. The seller and the buyer have but to agree about 

 the price, and the buyer pay over the price, and a visit be made 

 to the factor requesting him to put out the seller's name and 

 enter the buyer's name as proprietor in his roll of the kindly 

 tenants, and on a small payment being made, I believe a shilling, 

 the transaction is closed. 



15th April, 1898. 



Mr Robert Murray, V.P., in the Chair. 



Donations and Exchanges. — Report of the British Association 

 for the Advancement of Science, London, 1897 ; Transactions of the 

 Edinburgh Geological Society, Vol. VII., part 3 ; Proceedings 

 and Transactions of the Nova Scotian Institute of Science, 

 Halifax, Nova Scotia, Vol. IX., part 3 ; the Scottish Beochs, a 

 Theory of their Destruction, by James Cursiter. 



Exhibit. — Rev. Mr Andson showed a token of Closeburn 

 Church of date about 1721 marked C K. 



a 



