SITTYTON TO ABERDEEN. 157 



and an ancestor in direct descent of the cousins at 

 Tillyfour and Easter Skeiie was buried just 150 years 

 since in the parish of Tough. His grandson William 

 began to farm Lynturk in 1748, and was reputed to 

 be the strongest man in seven parishes round. He 

 had also, like " the big M'Comie," seven sons, of 

 which the three youngest Thomas, Peter, and 

 Charles all became lairds. Thomas was an Aber- 

 deen baillie, and left Easter Skene to his son William, 

 the present possessor, who also got Lynturk through 

 his uncle Peter; and Charles, who did not care for 

 the quiet life of an Aberdeen merchant, and preferred 

 the more exciting one of a lean cattle dealer, invested 

 in land, and left Tillyfour and Tullyriach to his eldest 

 son, the Rev. Dr. Charles M'Combie, minister of 

 Lumphanan, who lets them to his brother. 



Easter Skene lies midway between the Dee and 

 the Don. Its present owner succeeded to it in '27, 

 and since then he has reclaimed the whole of the 

 estate from heather and bog, and, with the 

 exception of some on the north-east side, has planted 

 every tree on it. The plantations alone extend 

 over 130 acres, and the stone fences to 30 miles, 

 supplemented, whenever shelter is required, by a hedge 

 of beech or hawthorn. Many of the fields have been 

 in grass for nearly twenty years ; and when they are 

 broken up, only a single crop of oats is taken, and 

 then turnips. This root is never known to fail, and 

 finger-and-toe is unheard of, which seems to suggest 

 that the disease is rather the result of exhaustion, 



