RECLAMATION OF LAND 371 



for its agriculturists, its Farmers' Club being one of 

 the oldest that has preserved a continuous existence. 

 Seaward of Elgin lies an extensive plain known as the 

 Laigh of Moray, much of it only 20 ft. or so above 

 sea level, where the prevalence of names in Muir tell 

 of the conditions that prevailed at no distant date, 

 while the ditches and the drainage canals show the 

 means by which it has been reclaimed. Indeed the 

 reclamation has been a process well within living 

 memory ; the greater part of it was accomplished 

 about two generations ago, mainly by tenant-farmers 

 who took a 19 years' improving lease, within which 

 period they had to win back the money and labour 

 expended in bringing the greater part of their farms 

 into cultivation, and in many cases erecting the very 

 substantial buildings that are now found. On some 

 estates the tenants had a claim for improvements, 

 which was allowed for in fixing the new rent. Generally 

 the farms are of a fair size, the average being about 

 200 acres, though a few are larger. In the flat mari- 

 time district crofts are few, those small holdings are 

 generally situated on the foothills above the plain ; as 

 far as we could gather, there are as many if not more 

 than are wanted, and but few applications for small 

 holdings have come in to the new Scotch Board of 

 Agriculture. They are mostly devoted to stock raising, 

 and as such are valuable to the farmers of the plain, 

 who fatten but do not breed cattle ; but the raising of 

 stores is not a very intensive form of farming, and the 

 general opinion was that there was more call for the 

 improvement of existing small holdings than for the 

 creation of new ones. Among these hill farms some- 

 thing might be done to improve the quality of the live 

 stock they produce, by introducing good-class bulls to 

 stand at a small fee, as at present the strain of cattle 



