1 54 Report on some features of Scottish Agriculture. 
Such is, in brief, the manner in which the Scotcla system of 
land-tenure affects the landlord, the tenant, and the nation. But 
the labourer belongs to anotber class of the community on which it 
also has a distinctive effect. The landlord invites tenders for a 
farm, and if the rent offered by the highest bidder is satisfactory 
the lease is frequently drawn out without any stipulations as to 
the erection of new cottages. Generally speaking, the steading 
is in good order ; but, if not, the landlord announces in the first 
instance what repairs or improvements are to be made ; because, 
as a rule, the farm-steading is a very great item in calculating 
the rent-value of a farm across the Border. But, as regards 
labourers' cottages, the case is different, and, as already stated, 
they not rarely remain to be patched and repatched by the 
incoming farmer, or his ploughman, as the case may be. 
East Bakns. 
The literature of Agriculture abounds in records of the 
manner in which natural difficulties have been overcome by 
farmers ; but the methods by which natural advantages have 
been turned to account have attracted less attention. This 
feature of Agriculture I shall endeavour to illustrate by the 
following description of East Barns, in the occupation of Mr. 
James Murray. The farm is three miles east of Dunbar, and 
lies on both sides of the high road to Cockburns-path, between 
the Lammermuir Hills and the sea. It is wonderfully sheltered 
from extremes of climate, and the winter temperature is so mild 
that it makes a great difference in the period at which some 
agricultural operations are carried out. There is, however, 
something more than degrees of temperature or inches of rain 
to be noticed. The soil is a rich red loam, which has been 
formed by the decomposition of the more or less subjacent 
Old Red Sandstone ; it is about nine inches in depth, and is 
endowed with remarkable natural fertility. But natural fertility 
requires to be sustained, and even this is partly done by Nature, 
for Mr. Murray's lease includes the privilege of hauling "sea- 
ware " from about a mile and a half of coast, which is equal to 
a heavy dressing of farmyard-manure for from 25 to 40 acres of 
land, according to the season. 
The farm consists of about 500 imperial acres of arable land. 
It is held on a nineteen years' lease, under Alexander Mitchell- 
Innes, Esq., of Ayton Castle, at an annual rental of 2400/, and 
the current lease is the second which has been taken by the 
present tenant. Considering the nature of a small piece of about 
nineteen acres of pasture, and the fact that the arable land 
includes about five acres of " links," — a poor sandy soil — it is 
