724 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION M. 
proved, but Parliament, having no money wherewith to pay, granted him per- 
mission to distil all the grain of Ferintosh at a nominal duty. Thus, says John 
Hill Burton, Ferintosh became ‘ illustrious as the head-quarters of the distilling 
of whisky,’ and he adds, ‘so short-sighted is man, the efforts of the “merry 
monarch ’”’ to subdue the spirit of the stubborn Presbyterian became the source 
of conviviality for generations after he and his roystering companions were in 
their graves.’ To Duncan Forbes and Ferintosh rather than to the Duke of 
Hamilton or Mr. Henricus Van Wyngaerden may be attributed the wide adver- 
tisement of native liquor and the gradual displacement of French brandy. 
During the twenty-two years of its existence the Honourable Society of 
Improvers became a powerful and important body. Its influence, it should be 
noted, was obtained by educational methods, for its funds were small, it had no 
State subsidy as had the Irish Society, it offered no premiums, but it drew 
together in the cause of agricultural improvement many of the most prominent 
Scotchmen of the period, and it undoubtedly laid the foundations of that suc- 
cessful agriculture for which Scotland has ever since been noted. In 1743 the 
Society had 299 members, and an examination of the list reveals many well-known 
names representing all sections of the educated classes of Scotland, with the 
notable exception of the clergy. The great territorial houses were represented 
by the Dukes of Athole, Hamilton, and Perth, the Earls of Breadalbane, Hope- 
toun, Stair, and others; politics by Duncan Forbes of Culloden and his restless 
neighbour Simon of the °45; the College of Justice, the Bar, Writers to the 
Signet, the University of Edinburgh, and the Medical profession by Bethunes, 
Campbells, Dalrymples, Erskines, Fergusons, Gordons, and many another well- 
known Scottish name. A link with the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries of 
to-day existed in Sir John Anstruther of Anstruther; and of another member, 
Alexander Brodie of Brodie, Lord Lyon, I have been frequently reminded in 
preparing this Address, for my copy of ‘ Columella’ bears his bookplate. 
But of all the members, those who best deserve our notice are Thomas Hope 
of Rankeilor, President, and Robert Maxwell of Arkland, editor of the ‘ Trans- 
actions.’ Mackintosh refers to Hope as a man who had taught improved agricul- 
ture to hundreds of his fellow-countrymen. He studied the subject not only in 
England, but in France, Flanders, Holland, and other Continental countries, and 
Maxwell says of him ‘that it has been much owing to Mr. Hope of Rankeilor 
your Preses, that this Society was entered into and that the Spirit of it rose so 
high,’ and adds that he ‘has been instructing others in the Knowledge of it and 
been preaching up the publick and private Advantages arising from it for a con- 
tinued Tract of more than Twenty Years’ Time.’ Of the spirit which animated 
Robert Maxwell himself we have ample evidence in the Dedication of the ‘ Select 
Transactions.” Reviewing what has been done by the Society and considering 
that which might still be done, Maxwell writes, ‘since the Case stands thus, 
how much doth it concern the Publick and every Individual that Agriculture 
be encouraged and that the Knowledge of it, the efficient Cause of all those 
inestimable Benefits, should be taught to all who are willing to learn the Prin- 
ciples of this the most useful of all the Sciences; to all who desire to know the 
secret Causes why some plants enrich, and others impoverish the Ground in 
which they grow; why different Methods of Husbandry produce different Effects ; 
and in general to all who incline to study the Reasons for and against, the 
different Methods practised? They that do not study Agriculture as a Science 
do right only by chance, and that rarely happens. Why then should Reason be 
so little exercised, as generally it is, in this Matter of the greatest Importance?’ 
He then refers to the opinions of Virgil, and to the views expressed by Columella 
on the subject of teaching agriculture, and he urges the Society to take steps 
to found a professorship, or to secure an inspector of experiments; ‘surely a 
practical farmer should be chosen, who could teach Rules established upon 
rational Experiments tried in our own country; one who has given Testimonies 
that he has studied, and does understand the Principles of Agriculture. Your 
careful Endeavours to get a Fund settled for such a Professor or Inspector 
would crown your former labours. It will then be said and be certainly true, 
that you did all you could as Zmprovers in the Knowledge of Agriculture.’ 
Maxwell proposed that the Society should address a Memorial to the King 
on the subject of a Professorship. ‘You are,’ he wrote, ‘a great Body of loyal 
subjects and generally of great Distinction, and I humbly think upon a proper 
