( 19 ) 



melancholy operation. Nineteen years after his re- 

 port to my grandfather, he was again called upon to 

 report to his successor on the condition of Tyree. In 

 1822 he was obliged to report that, as a "natural con- 

 sequence " of the system adopted, " the families have 

 now multiplied to such an unmanageable degree that 

 the whole produce of the Island is hardly sufficient 

 for their maintenance, and the crowded population on 

 its surface exhibit in many instances cases of indivi- 

 dual wretchedness and misery that perhaps are nob 

 to be found in any part of Scotland." The farms 

 which had long been possessed by small tenants were 

 now found to contain 2869 souls, whilst the five 

 farms which had been broken up into small lots now 

 contained no less than 1080. The potato disease 

 was as yet unknown, but the ordinary vicissitudes of 

 the seasons are always at hand to punish glaring de- 

 partures from sound economic laws. 1821 wtis a 

 year of extraordinary drought, and on the light sandy 

 soils of Tyree the crops were almost a total failure. 

 The cattle were almost starved, and were so lean as 

 to be unsaleable. Kelp was again the only resource. 

 There was an extraordinary supply of it in 1821. 

 By this means and by wholesale remissions of rent, the 

 crisis was tided over ; but no permanent remedy was 

 applied, and so matters went on again in the old rut. 

 In the course of forty-three years from my grand- Population had 



father's subdivision of the farms,— with little or no ""^^'^^ ^^^^'^ '" 



' course 01 43 years 



increase of agricultural production, and an immense de- at time of potato 

 ficit in a manufacturing resource, — the population had ^^ ^^^ in i 4 . 

 nearly doubled, so that when the crash of the potato 

 failure came in 1846 it exceeded 5000 souls, whilst 

 the small crofts had been so much farther subdivided' 



