42 Transactions. 



shall think fit to modify to be paid with and over and above 

 the resting fee. And, further, the said Justices enact and 

 ordain that all persons who have been ordinary servants or 

 are in any capacity or ability to serve, both men and women, 

 older and younger, and are not presently in service, that 

 they immediately apply themselves thereto and fee them- 

 selves to such persons as have occasion for them, not exceed- 

 ing the said fees and wages above mentioned, otherways to 

 be reputed and holden as vagabonds, and punished as s\ich, 

 and that the Justices in their several disti"icts cause appre- 

 hend all such idly disposed persons as shall after the term of 

 Whitsunday next be found within the same and incarcerate 

 them until such time as they go to service or find caution 

 or enact themselves to serve in the foresaid terms : Declar- 

 ing that the above regulations with respect to the extent of 

 fees shall not be extended to Annandale or the Five Kirks 

 of Eskdale, where because of their vicinity to England 

 different rules are necessary to be observed, which the 

 Justices in that bounds are desired to make, and in the 

 meantime they are to proceed as formerly. And the Justices 

 ordain these presents to be immediately printed and pub- 

 lished and a copy thereof to be sent to the precentor of each 

 parish kirk to be by him read the first Sunday after receipt 

 of tlie same immediately after divine service, and retained 

 in the custody of the said precentor that all persons may 

 have access to see this Act, and appoint copies thereof to be 

 fixed on the several kirk doors and on the mercat crosses of 

 the several burghs within this shire that none pretend 

 ignorance thereof." 



The allowance made in the scale of wages fixed by the 

 Justices for pairs of shoes enables a comparison to be drawn 

 betwixt the real value of wages in 1751 and in 1866. I find 

 upon enquiry that the present price of the strong shoes 

 worn. by workmen is 12s. 6d. ; in 1751 the price was 2s. 6d. 

 The average wages of experienced ploughmen at present is 

 £18 per annum, giving a purchasing power of nearly thirty 

 pairs of shoes ; the wages in 1751 possessed a purchasing 



