6o HIGHLAND AND AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



potatoes, the culture of wheat or turnip having been but 

 seldom attempted. The plough was generally drawn with 

 three, though frequently with two horses. Potatoes were 

 beginning to be planted regularly in drills. ' On the whole, 

 in this interior part of the country, a methodic style of 

 farming could yet be reckoned only in its infancy.' In 

 Kells, the highest parish in the county, only about 280 

 acres were laid out in oats. Cabbage and other roots were 

 only raised in gardens. The old Scotch plough, drawn by 

 four horses abreast, had been laid aside, and farmers broke 

 up their lea ground with three horses. The farmers de- 

 pended upon their black cattle, sheep, and wool for paying 

 their rent. No artificial grass was sown in the parish till 

 within ten years before the date of the report, and there 

 might then be twenty acres. It could only be raised by lime 

 or marie. ' The present minister was the first who brought 

 marie to the Glenkens, and the project was then laughed 

 at.' In Kirkmabreck the principal manure used for im- 

 proving the land recently had been sea shells, ' of which 

 there is an inexhaustible quantity, not only within the 

 high-w^ater mark on this side of Wigton Bay, but also in 

 the dry land, several hundred yards from the shore, where 

 they are found in beds from four to ten feet deep of the 

 finest shells imaginable, without almost any mixture of sand. 

 Many thousand tons of these shells are carried off annually, 

 and sold at as high as 3s. 6d. a ton.' In Minnigaff sheep 

 formed the staple commodity of the parish, their number 

 being no less than 30,000. ' They are of the small species, 

 with black face, and legs covered with wool of very inferior 

 quality.' Besides sheep, a considerable number of black 

 cattle were bred in the parish. ' They are the Galloway 

 cattle, very handsome, short legged, deep in the rib, broad 

 over the loins, and in general without horns. They weigh 

 remarkably well to their apparent bulk.' In Twyneholm 

 and Kirk-christ the cattle were for the most part Polled, 

 long haired, short and thick-legged for their height, 

 straight-backed, round bodied, well spread at the loins, 

 and deep dew-lapped. The reporter for the parish men- 

 tions that any trials to improve the Galloway breed by 



