INTRODUCTION xxiii 



available regarding the work of this man as an agricultural 

 pioneer. He gives only two letters, out of many, to Wight 

 (August 1725 and December 1726), and these and the 

 articles should be read by every one interested, as they supple- 

 ment the correspondence now published, a correspondence 

 which throws a flood of light on the little-known subject 

 of the rise of modern agriculture in what has ever since 

 been the premier district of Scotland, as well as on the 

 social development of the villager, the gardener, and the 

 country gentleman. 



A Model Scottish Landlord 



The Ormistoun of two centuries ago presented the usual 

 landscape of the time. The upper lands were heath-clad 

 moor, perpetually grazed by half-starved cattle ; the hollows 

 by the river-side undrained marsh, from which, in dry seasons, 

 some poor hay was secured as the only winter fodder avail- 

 able. Ten crofters near the village held patches of arable 

 infield in run-dale or long narrow strips, on which crops of 

 bere, oats, or pease were raised in succession till a year in the 

 natural dress of weeds gave repose. These crofters were the 

 kindly rentallers of the barony, tenants at will. Bell's father 

 was one of them. What Cockburn thought of their farming 

 comes out in this to Bell about his father's land, 'His 

 Husbandry goes no further than to gett bad grain one year 

 and worse the next' (p. 17). On the south side of the Tyne 

 were four farms, and on two of these Adam Cockburn made 

 the novel experiment (1698 and 1713) of granting long leases, 

 and this at a time when farmers were too poor and too sus- 

 picious to take such a risk. It was a period, too, of political 

 ferment and widespread poverty. This pioneer lease-holding 

 farmer was Robert Wight, of a family long settled on the 

 lands. An ancestor married (1559) a daughter of John 

 Cockburn, the reformer. Alexander Wight, mentioned above, 



