FINDLATER’S AGRICULTURE OF PEEBLES. 
aecept of them with so small a reward 
for severe labour. Accounts have been 
received, he says, from 427 parishes. 
The average income for each school- 
master seems to be from 23]. to 241. a 
year: the amount of the income of the 
schoolmaster, in each of the 427 parishes, 
was taken from his own affidavit, sworn 
before a justice of the peace. There is 
good reason to think, that when the list 
shall be completed for the whole of 
North Britain the average will be still 
lower. Of the 427 parishes the income 
of six is less than 10]. a yeareach. One 
is 61. 18s. 10d. Several of the school- 
masters say that they could not live with- 
out the aid of their relations: a journey- 
man mason can earn 30). a year. 
‘In one of Mr. Findlater’s notes (which, 
by the way, constitute a valuable portion 
_of this volume, embracing a variety of 
topics connected with the civil and ec- 
clesiastical policy and laws of Scotland), 
he informs us that the court of presby- 
tery, with concurrence of the county 
commissioners, can compel the heritors 
(or landed proprietors) of every parish 
to make provision of a legal salary fora 
schoolmaster, and to build an house for 
the schoolmaster’s residence, and a school 
for teaching in. Now the maximum legal 
_ salary cannot exceed 111. 10s. 2d. 8-12th 
- a year, the minimum is 5\. 11s. 1d, 4-12th, 
one half is payable by the proprietors, 
the other by the occupiers of the land. 
The schoolmaster, he further tells us, is 
almost always constituted precentor (the 
person who leads the singing of psalms 
- in church) and clerk tothe kirk-session ! ! 
Mr. ¥. estimates the average emolument 
of the Scots parochial schoolmasters at 
_ 20 guineas a year, which coincides very 
nearly with the returns actually received 
when Mir. Chrisiston wrote ; and if they 
_ are completed is perhaps perfectly accu- 
rate. The wages oi teaching must ne- 
cessarily be very low: they vary fram a 
shilling to eighteen-pence a quarter for 
reading English, and from half a crown 
to three shillings for reading, writing, 
and arithmetic ; the scholars too paying 
_only for the precise time of attendance ! 
It would be derogator make any 
apology for dwelling so long on a subject 
of such importance. 
Chap. TV. <‘ From yarious causes, 
says Mr. F., Scotland was more late in 
being relieved from the oppression of 
feudal aristocracy than her sister king- 
dom. The last act of parliament to that 
effect, and for which we are indebted to our 
703 
rebellion in 1745, being so recent as the 
year 1748.” Rent we are told is yet 
paid in money, in kind, and in personal 
service ; in Tweeddale, however, the 
proportion of rent paid in kind, or per- 
sonal service, is very trifling ; the more 
enlightened among proprietors entirely 
relinquishing all rent of this species. 
«« By act of parliamegt 1748, the arbitrary 
unspecified services of nse and wont, an obli- 
gation to which was inferred at common law, 
though not expressed in the lease, are all 
abolished. hey would seem, formerly, to 
have furnished a pretext for endless vexation 
and oppression of the tenantry ; even so far 
as to devolve upon them most of the public 
taxes imposed hy parliament upon the pro- 
prietors of the land. No prestation is now 
exigible from the tenant, but what is express- 
ly stipulated in his lease ; with exception of 
such legal burdens as are already, or shall be 
directly imposed upon him by act of parlia- 
ment; and also of his adstriction to the 
mill.” 
This adstriction to the mill is called 
thirlage ; it infers an obligation upon 
the tenant to grind his grain at that par- 
ticular mill to which the lands he occu- 
pies are thirled ; i.e. which possesses 
the exclusive privilege of manufacturing 
the grain of these lands. It has been 
conjectured that formerly the great ba- 
ron obliged all his tenants to bring their 
whole grindable produce to his mill, as a 
sure method of ascertaining the quantity 
grown, and of collecting, as rent, his 
own stipulated proportion. The portion 
retained is called multure ; this abomina- 
ble remnant of vassalage died away so 
lately as in the year 1799, when an act 
was obtained to enforce the commutation 
of thirlage into an annual payment in 
grain, according to the award of a jury 
appointed by the sheriff of the county where 
the mill is situated, * if the servient and 
dominant tenements are in different 
counties.” Only under this circum- 
stance ? 
The rate of thirlage varied in different 
baronies, both as to the proportion of 
produce which the mill had the exclu- 
sive right.of manufacturing, and as to 
the proportion retained as multure. 
«* Thirlage not only subjects the tenant of 
the thirled lands to an higher rate of multure, 
but also to various other burdens and vexa+ 
tions. If the mill to which he is adstricted 
should be out of repair—let his demand be 
ever so urgent, or his grain in ever such risk 
of being spoiled, he must allow the miller a 
proper: time for reparation (some say six 
weeks from the time of application) befor: 
