476 
Sutherland Reclamation. 
completed. Trenching and clearing are the only important 
operations of which the full cost is already known. By dividing 
the cost of the trenching by 490, the number of acres that have 
been worked, the cost will be found to be 745. per acre ; but of 
these 490 acres, 340 were trenched deeply, and 150 only ploughed 
a single furrow deep. 
Although the total amount expended is known, we cannot 
exactly ascertain the relative cost of the two operations, but it is 
probable that the 340 acres cost hi. 13s., and the 150 acres 4/. 
per acre. Not only is this result very satisfactory in itself, as 
showing that such work can be done by steam at a much smaller 
cost than by any other power, but there is this feature of special 
promise about it, viz. that a considerable part of the work was 
done by the implement in its less perfect form, and there is 
every reason to conclude that, as the cost per acre of the 
ploughing at Shinness steadily decreased on each of those four 
farms one after the other as they were taken in hand, so a further 
diminution may be expected as the work proceeds on this second 
group of farms in the Kildonan district. It will be noticed that 
the cost of clearing is also less per acre than it was upon any of 
the Shinness farms ; but the difference here is less marked when 
the character of the land is taken into consideration. 
The sandy nature of the soil would naturally make the crops 
grown upon it more liable than those at Shinness to be dried 
up in time of drought, but with deep cultivation there need be 
little fear on this account. 
I have given the description of the No. II. Acliintoul farm 
first, as it was the one first taken in hand ; it will now be con- 
venient to take the other farms in numerical order, as they occur 
upon the map, beginning with the most northerly, Bannock- 
burn No. I. 
Bannochhurn Farm. — The name of this spot recalls a famous 
battle-field, in no way connected with it, and some 300 miles 
distant. It is singular that, though history has preserved no record 
of it, numerous cairns of stones, marking the graves of those who 
were slain, attest the fact that this, too, must at one time have been 
the site of one of those numerous fights, between the Sutherland 
and Caithness men, that were of such common occurrence along 
the border-line of the two counties. 
On the eastern side of this land the peat is from 2 to 4 feet 
deep, but the greater part of it is covered with thin turf, not 
more than 12 inches deep, resting upon a poor sandy subsoil. 
The shepherds say that the sheep never throve here, but began 
to pine as soon as they were put upon it. The absence of 
larsc stones and of roots has made the cultivation of the land 
comparatively easy. In October 1877 the Sutherland plough 
commenced work in the No. 12 field, which adjoins the 
