Book I. 



AGRICULTURE OF SUTHERLAND. 



M93 



1760, it may safely be concluded, that agricultural knowledge 

 was neither sought tor nor desired. The mode of management 

 which has been practised in these counties, and in other parts 

 of the highlands, and which has been handed down from 

 father to son fp. many generations, is still to be found in the 

 midst of the most improved districts. We still see the arable 

 land divided into small crofts, and many of the hills occupied 

 as commons. On the west coast particularly, the ground is 

 seen covered with heaps of stones, and large quantities are col- 

 let ted on the divisions between the fields ; so that a consider- 

 able portion of the land, capable of cultivation, is thus rendered 

 useless, by the indulgence of the most unpardonable sloth. 

 The management of the native farmers is most destructive. 

 The soil of one field is dug away to be laid upon another; 

 and crop succeeds crop, until the land refuses to yield any 

 thing. It is then allowed to rest for a season, and the weeds 

 get time to multiply. Such, we must suppose, was the system 

 of farming before the rebellion ; we cannot imagine it to have 

 been worse. 



2. Buildings. 



The old highland tenantry are universally ill accommodated. 

 They live in the midst of filth and smoke ; that is their ch< ice. 

 But wherever farms have been laid out on a proper scale, and 

 we occupied by substantial and well-educated men, we find the 

 farm-houses and offices handsome and commodious. Every 

 proprietor who wishes to see his estate rapidly improved, will 

 erect suitable buildings, at his own expense, before he invites a 

 good tenant to settle upon it. The interest of his money will 

 be always cheerfully paid ; and if the landlord agrees that the 

 repairs shall be maae at the mutual expense of himself and his 

 tenant, the latter will thrive, and the former will never have 

 to demand his rent twice. The present race of highland 

 tenants will yet find themselves much happier, and more com- 



fortable, in the capacity of servants to substantial tenants, than 

 in their present situation. The dwellings of cottagers arc not 

 worse than those of the native farmers. The same roof coven 

 men, women, children, catt'e, dogs, pigs, poultry, &c. It must 

 afford great pleasure to every lover of his country to observe the 

 neat cottages that are erecting in every part of the country ; but 

 it will be long ere the people will leam the comforts of cleanli- 

 ness and the use of chimneys. In many places where these 

 have been constructed, the people do not use them, but prefer 

 breaking a hole in the roof of the house, and lighting their lire 

 on the floor.. Smoke, they say, keeps them warm. 



The occupation and management of land is the same as in 

 other mountain districts. Some grain, chiefly oats, is raised in 

 the low grounds, with root and herbage crops, and the pastures 

 are devoted to the breeding of cattle and sheep. Every im- 

 provement is tried by the principal proprietors; and enlightened 

 farmers from the south of Scotland, accustomed to breeding, 

 induced to settle on their estates, by long leases and moderate 

 rents. From these the smaller native farmers take an example 

 sooner than they would from the operations of proprietors, 

 which they are apt to consider as at least of dubious value. 

 When a rent-paying farmer, however, adopts plans new to 

 them, the case is very different. Of woods, in this district, 

 there are very few ; but many plantations have been lately 

 made round gentlemen's seats, especially Lord Seaforth's. In 

 1821, Colin Mackenzie, Esq. of Kilcoy, planted 200 acres with 

 5000 trees; the sorts, oak, Scotch pine, larch, alder, birch, 

 ash, Find some ornamental trees. {Highl. Hoc. Trans, vol. vi. 

 p. 258.) 



The great post roads in this district have been made, in part 

 by government, and in part by the proprietors. Thtre is a 

 cotton manufactory at Cromarty, and the reporter suggests the 

 idea of manufacturing tar from the trunks of lir trees, found 

 bedded in all the mosses of this and other highland districts. 



7855. CAITHNESS. 395,680 acres, three eighths of which is deep, mossy, and flat moors, covered with 

 heath ; three eighths mountain, moor, and some hilly pasture ; and the remainder in cultivatable land, lakes, 

 &c There is very little wood, either natural or artificial ; but excellent lime and freestone On the whole 

 it is one of the coldest, wettest, and most dreary counties of Scotland ; and is in no way remarkable, unless 

 for being the scene of Sir John Sinclair's practical attempts at improvement Of these the chief seems to 

 have been the enlargement of the town of Thurso ; of which, and of various other schemes, ample in- 

 formation is given in the report, and in a number of appendices to it, by Sir John himself. {Henderson's 

 General View, 1812.) 



1. Property. 



Is in a few hands, and the Irish practice of tacksmen tenants 

 exists, and has existed from time immemorial in the county. 

 These tacksmen, as they are called, generally occupy a part 

 of the land llumselves, and sub-let the remainder to the small 

 farmers, for a certain money-rent, payments in grain, customs, 

 and service (the latter in many cases unlimited) ; so as to have, 

 upon the whole, a sui plus rent for the trouble and risk of reco- 

 vering their rack-rents from the sub-tenants. 



A few young men from the south of Scotland have been 

 brought to this county, to superintend the proprietors* farms or 

 domains, for the purpose of introducing the practice of modern 

 husbandry. These, from time to time, have taken farms in 

 this county; but whether their agricultural skill was superfi- 

 cial, or that they did not understand the mode of farming best 

 adapted to this cold and moist climate, they have neither in- 

 creased the crops, nor improved the landlords' farms placed 

 under their direction ; nor has their industry or skill produced 

 better crops on their own farms than what is raised by a similar 

 class of the county farmers, who have never been out of it. 



7856. SUTHERLAND. 1,872,000 acres, chiefly of mountain and moor; and a climate about a fort- 

 night later than that of Edinburgh. The greater "part of the county is the property of the Marquess of 

 Stafford, whose astonishing, masterly, and successful improvements have been amply detailed in Loch's 

 work, from which we derived so much information for Staffordshire and Shropshire, and to which we 

 again recur. {Henderson's General View, fyc. Lock's Improvements of the Marquess oj Stafford, $c. 1819.) 



across the Dornoch and other friths, and the total -want of 

 roads in the county till ISO!). The estate of Sutherland 

 (.fig. 1151. a, a, a), including the b-'rony of Assynl (!■, b, />), and 



The principal farmers in the county under review are intelli- 

 gent gentlemen, who have been for some time in the army, or fol- 

 lowtd other avocations, either in the southern counties of Scot- 

 land or in England, who work their farms upon the principles 

 of modern agriculture, as practised in the southern counties of 

 Scotland, as far as the state of the county, as to climate, roads, 

 the means of improvement, markets, &c. will admit, but at a 

 much greater expense than is done to the southward, and, of 

 couise, much less benefit to themselves. In general they have 

 other sources of income, which enable them to live in a social 

 and comfortable state in society ; they are better educated than 

 farmers paying a similar rent in England; agricultural know- 

 ledge, therefore, is soon circulated amongst them. 



1 he smaller class of farmers, with but few exceptions, are in- 

 dustrious, sober, sagacious, and moral in their behaviour. They 

 have, unfortunately, a turn for litigation, and expend more 

 money than they ought to do in law, by which their circum- 

 stances are often injur* d. 



The estates of Sutherland have onlv lately undergone that 

 change which began to operate in England as far hack as the 

 reign of Henry VII. This change had for its obj ct the cre- 

 ation of a middle class, by the depression of the barons and the 

 raising up of the next class of the community. This obj ct 

 was gradually and successfully accomplished in England by the 

 time of Queen Elizabeth, and in the south of Scotland soon 

 after the union of the two kingdoms: but the highlands, or 

 most northerly counties, underwent no change till the discom- 

 fiture of ihe pretender, and the abolition of the heritable juris- 

 dictions then existing in the north, in 1747. This invaluable 

 act having brought the highland chieftains within the pale of 

 the law, and placed them on the same footing as the other 

 gentlemen of the land, they b' gan rapidly to acquire the same 

 tastes, to be occupied with "the same pursuits, to feel the same 

 desires, and to have tie same wants as their brethren in the 

 south. In order, however, to indulge the.-e propensities, and 

 to be able to appear in the capital with due effect, it was ne- 

 cessary that they should convert their estates to that mode of 

 occupation most sui'ed to their circumstances, and from which 

 they could derive .he greatest income. Luckily in this, as in 

 every otl er instance in political economy, the interest of the 

 individual and the prosperity of the state went hand in hand. 

 And the demand for the raw material of wool by the English 

 manufacturers, enabled the highland proprietor to let his lands 

 for quadruple the amount they ever before produced to him- 

 These arrangements continued to be carried into effect from 

 time to time, in the southern and central highlands, up to 

 about the commencement of the French revolution war ; not 

 nN ays, however, without serious resistance on the part of the 

 l*onie. 



Ihe northern highlands still remained to undergo that change 

 which the rest of the island had already adopted. In this d strict 

 it naturallv 1 egan to be followed in the counties situated near- 

 est to those into which it had already been introduced. In 

 Ross-shire, accordinglv, it was undertaken on a great scale, in 

 1792. The dissatisfaction produced was so great, that the 

 most serious affrays took place, and the military had to act, 

 and blood was shed before quiet was restored. Between that 

 time and 1815, the greater portion of the county of Sutherland, 

 belonging to Lord and Lady Stafford, was arranged acccrding 

 to those plans so universally adopted. This ancient condition 

 of society prevailed longer on the estate of Sutherland than in 

 any other part of the island, on account of its difficult access 



the late purchases made by the Marquess of Stafford, up to 

 1S19, was computed to conttin more than 800,000 acres. Tie 

 estate of Lord Reay (c) is more than half that extent ; it was 

 purchased some time ago by ihe Marquess of Stafford, and an- 

 nexed to his own est. te. The residue of the county belongs to 

 different smaller proprietors (d to n). 



In 1809 was begun a line of road, conducted according to 

 the best principles of the art, and made in the most perfi Ct 

 manner, from the town of Inverness by Beauty and Dingwall, 

 to the boundaries of the county of Sutherland ; two excellent 

 stone bridges, consisting of five arches each, lav ng been built 

 across the Beaul) and Conon rivers. The two principal ob- 

 structions these roads had to contend with and to surmount 

 wire those whuh were occasioned by the two ft ithsof Domoc h 

 {.fig. 1131. 1.) and of Loch Fleet (2). The former, especially, 

 presented obstacles of considerable moment, arising out of tne 

 width of the channel, and the want of a proper foundation on 

 which to construct a bridge. If the same plan had been fol- 

 lowed in this instance, which has been adopted on the two 

 southern ferries, namely, of ascending to the point at which 

 the frith terminates and* becomes a river, it would have airritd 

 the road so much into the interior, as to counterbalance those 

 advantages which are at all times obtaintd by the substitution 

 of a bridge in the place of the most perfect ferry which can be 

 established. To avoid either of these inconveniences, a viry 

 careful survey of the whole frith was made; and the engineer, 

 Telford, determined to recommend the construction of an iron 

 bridge of magnificent dimensions (See an engraved view in the 

 F.d. Encyc.) at Bonar, a point where the frith narrows itself 

 considerably, and above which it again expands, though not 

 to its former dimensions. This structure consists of an exten- 

 sive embankment, with two stone arches of fifty and sixty feet 

 span, respectively ; and one iron arch of 150 feet span. It cost 

 13,97 W. From this point, the heritors of Sutherland have con- 

 structed a road (1,4) to Tongue (c), the seat of Lord Reay, 

 situated upon the Northern * wean. 



In many places, these roads are cut through the hardest 

 rock : in others, thev are obliged to be supported on bulwarks 

 of solid masonrv. Expensive drains to protect them from the 

 mountain floods, and bridges over the innumerable streams 

 that rush from the hills in every direction, are required. These 



