104 BENBECULA. HIGHLAND POPULATION. 



can command are to be relied on, the actual population 

 of the Isles appear to have been nearly doubled in the 

 last sixty years. It is indifferent for the present purpose 

 whether this statement be very precise or not. The 

 existence of frequent scarcity or of absolute famine during 

 the early parts of this period, but chiefly before it, are 

 a sufficient proof of redundant population in those times. 

 There have been no instances of famine recently, for even 

 the great increase of population has been exceeded in 

 rapidity by that of the means of living.* The redundancy 

 is unquestionably much less than formerly, but it still 

 exists, and must necessarily under the present circum- 

 stances of these islands proceed in a constant increase 

 till it reaches the same limit which it touched sixty 

 years ago. Where that limit may be placed we cannot 

 tell, but it is evident that wherever so near a race is 

 run on this ground, an interference must occasionally 

 occur, or those inconveniences arising from occasional 

 excess of population must take place, of which Benbecula 

 among other districts presents an example. 



A consideration of the nature of this argument as far 

 as relates to the past is sufficient for illustrating it as 

 to the future. It is contended that no removal of 

 the people is necessary, because the means of living 

 are increasing in proportion to their additional numbers. 



* Although this is true in a general sense, it must not be too strictly 

 taken, as the inhabitants, both of the islands and the western coast, 

 whose means are at present but barely calculated to meet their consump- 

 tion, occasionally suffer great privations on any check to their harvest or 

 to the expected produce of their fishery. The last year (1817) was 

 peculiarly marked by an interval between the consumption of the old 

 crop and the ripening of the new one, attended with distress approaching 

 to famine. In Sutherland numerous families subsisted on fish alone, 

 often on shell fish, for near two months, neither meal nor potatoes 

 remaining. At length, although the coast abounded with fish, the men 

 were so enfeebled that they were unable to row their boats out to the 

 fishery, and many were confined to their beds from the consequences of 

 exhaustion. 



