TO THE EIGHT HONOUEABLE 



LORD NAPIER AND ETTRICK, 



CHAIRMAN OF THE ROYAL COMMISSION 

 (HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS). 



My Lord, — I deem it my duty to communicate to 

 your Lordship, as chairman of the Eoyal Commission, 

 some authentic information in respect to my Estates of Statement relates 

 Tyree and the Eoss of Mull, which have been lately \^y''^ ""''^ ^^^^^ 

 visited by your Lordship and your colleagues. 



From documents connected with the management 

 of the estate, we have a tolerably complete account of 

 the population, value, and. condition of Tyree, from Tyree. 

 about the middle of the last century to the present 

 date. It may be of interest to the Commission to 

 know the leading facts. 



Leases of all the principal farms on the Island for the Leases of principal 

 usual term of nineteen years, or occasionally of twenty- t'ween^TJ\-i762 

 two years, were granted at various dates between 

 1753 and 1762. These Leases of course expired, at 

 various corresponding dates between 1772 and 1784. 

 It is towards the end of these Leases, and not at the 

 commencement of them, that we first have really de- 

 tailed information. They were granted by Archibald, 

 third Duke of Argyll, who succeeded in 1 743, but whose 

 busy political life probably prevented him from paying 

 close attention to agricultural affairs. But towards the 

 close of these Leases the Argyll estates weie in the hands 



