62 HIGHLAND AND AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Neither the Spanish nor the Shetland sheep had been found 

 to thrive.' The horses were a stout, handsome race, fit for 

 saddle, load, or draught. Most of the young horses were 

 the progeny of stallions introduced by the Earl of Gallo- 

 way and the late Admiral Keith Stewart. The chain 

 plough had been tried, but the common Scotch plough was 

 generally preferred. The cultivation of turnips, being re- 

 commended by the example and success of some of the 

 principal landowners, had begun to enter every year more 

 and more into the ordinary agriculture of the parish. In 

 Whithorn, turnips, though the land was well fitted for 

 them, were as yet seldom used, ' though their effects in 

 fattening old, and in giving bone to young cattle, were 

 great and evident.' The reporter says — 'The writer of this 

 report remembers the time in which there was scarcely a 

 turnip field to be seen in Northumberland, Roxburgh, or 

 Benvickshire, where such fields are now so much and so 

 justly valued.' In Penninghame the land was generally 

 fertile, having of late been improved with shells and 

 lime. In Mochrum a good many improvements had 

 been recently introduced. Lime had been employed 

 with good effect ; also shell sand. The Scotch plough 

 improved, or the chain plough, were chiefly used. Sheep 

 were not much cultivated in the parish, ' being considered 

 hurtful to young thorn hedges.' There were about 5000 

 in the parish ; and they comprised some specimens of 

 the old Galloway breed, 'with orange-coloured face and 

 legs.' The black cattle of the parish were those bred in 

 Galloway — very handsome. Their number was about 

 1500. 'Every farmer raises as many as he can, and no 

 more thinks of fatting and killing a calf than would an an- 

 cient inhabitant of Egypt. The cattle are usually sold, at 

 two years of age, for £^ a, head, to graziers or jobbers, and 

 are mostly all, sooner or later, driven to the English mar- 

 kets. The chief quality of a cow is that she be a good 

 breeder, and no attention is paid to milk, or the manufac- 

 turing of it into butter and cheese. Some of the farmers, 

 however, from a desire to improve their cattle in milking 

 qualities, have more than once introduced the famous "cows 



