of the land, and of failors and foldiers for the defence of the state. Policy, as well as humanity, calls loudly on the landlord to attend more to the cottager *.

Too high rents are on many estates the principal obftacle to improvement. Landlords confider high rents as a spur to improvement; and some have applied it fo freely as to make the galled fufferer first exert all his strength, and then sink in despair under the burden. When the horse falls, the rider is apt to fuffer. Landlords fhould be at pains to know the real value of their lands, and they will always find it fafer to keep below than to exceed it. If the tenant is diftreffed, he can have neither the fpirit nor the power to improve.

The common mode of letting lands to the highest bidder, by private offer, is also adverse to improvement. The most honeft, able, and skilful, are unwilling to fupplant a neighbour, and cautious of risking what they have already got, by cafting their lot into this dark myfterious urn: whereas, the unprincipled, the indigent, and the ignorant, who have neither character nor substance to lose, are always found to be the most forward. Some landlords however fay, perhaps justly, that they have no other way of judging of the value of their property. But they take too much for granted, if they think the perfons who offer are always better judges than themselves.

The want of skill, and of a proper system of husbandry, and particularly the neglect of green crops, operate against the improvement of the country, as alfo the general poverty of the fmaller tenants, where they hold their poffeffions in run-rig, as skill and capital are no lefs neceffary to improvement than industry. But kill, it is hoped, will foon be obtained by means of the general attention now paid every where to agricultural inquiries; and fkill, with industry, will foon increase the capital of the farmer, if the landlord will give due encouragement.

+ See Chap. IV. Sec. 1.

The little attention hitherto paid to manufactures is much against the improvement of the country. Should we manufacture our own wool, and raise hemp and flax, and work them into fail-cloth, cordage, and linen, riches would find their way to us, and improve the country; which is the usual confequence of manufactures.

The letting of farms to perfons who do not refide upon them is much against the improvement of the country. A tenant who refides will always be doing fomething towards the improvement of the farm; but he who plants it only with a herd or cottager will do nothing. A farm under this management is entirely left to nature, and muft therefore remain in the ftate in which it is.

But it is ftill a greater evil to let farms to such as take them for no other purpose but to fubfet them to others. These intermediate tenants are like the drones in a hive; they live upon the labour of others, and often beggar those beneath them, as well as intercept the advantage due to thofe above them. If the profits which are enjoyed by these people for doing nothing were divided, as they ought, between the labouring tenant and the proprietor, the first might be at his eafe, and the last have a confiderable acceffion to his income. A humane landlord fhould not put it in the power of any man to distress the poor upon his lands, and a wife landlord fhould not allow another to reap the advantage which is justly due to himself. And yet it is no uncommon thing for one proprietor to let fome of his lands to another, while that other will neither occupy thefe, perhaps, nor much of his own. Both these fyftems are adverse to the improvement of the country. A fubtenant paying a racked rent, and having feldom any leafe, has neither strength nor spirit to improve; and if a proprietor makes any improvement, it will be on his own lands, and not on those which he rents.

The falt laws, with the many oppreffive regulations con

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nected with them, are in the highest degree adverse to the industry and profperity of a great proportion of the inhabitants of this county, and of courfe to the improvement of the country. It is impoffible that, under fo good a government, this fhall continue long to be the cafe.

Scarcity of timber, the want of more commodious and comfortable houses, and better implements of husbandry, are all of them circumstances unfavourable to improvements; but the tendency to better things which already begins to appear, gives every reason to hope we shall make rapid progress.

A prejudice in favour of a coarse-woolled breed of sheep is in many respects unfavourable to the country: the wool brings lefs money, and the more valuable native breed is neglected, and in danger of being loft. Nothing could be of more importance to the county than to preserve and improve its native breed of horses, cows, and fheep, all which are capable of being brought to great perfection, and better adapted to the county than any other that have been, or perhaps can be tried.

Of all the obftacles to improvement none can be greater than the non-refidence of many of the heritors, which deprives the ground of almost any part of the rent being spent on the premises. If a farmer fhould fell all the straw or dung which should manure his farm, it could not be more hurtful to improvement than the landlord's fpending all his rents elsewhere. Two thirds, at least, of the rent are spent out of the county.

The intolerable number of dram-houses, which destroy the time, the morals, the means, and the health of the inhabitants, is also adverse in the extreme to induftry and improvement. Landlords are in no respect more blind to their own interest than in tolerating so many of these baneful nuisances. They think that the farmer, by means of them, gets a better price for his bear; but it were better the bear were caft into the

fea, than to have it thus converted into a deadly poison to the industry, morals, means, and health of the people. If the publican is thus enabled to pay a trifle of rent, it is at the expence of 50 or 100 of his neighbours, and ultimately at the expence of the landlord. The tenant might raise oats instead of bear, and the meal would always find a market; or he might raise green crops, and add to the number of his cattle. By this change, the tenant, the landlord, and the country, could be gainers.

Among the great obstacles to the profperity and improvement of this county, though not peculiar to it, may be mentioned the unhappy frequency of our wars. It may be computed that, between foldiers and failors, every war drains this county of between 3000 and 4000 of its most active and able hands, the support of thousands more. In comparison of this, how trifling are all our other loffes by emigration! Happy would it be for the natives of Europe, if fome general court could be established, in which all the quarrels of its ruling powers could be adjusted by delegates, who should fit as judges, and finally determine every conteft by their decifions, without the dreadful and fhocking appeal to the cannon, the bayonet, and the fword. How muft future ages be astonished at our madness, when the happy time shall come, in which there fhall be war no more! In the mean time, while we are attacked, it is neceffary to defend.

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CHAPTER XVII.

MISCELLANEOUS OBSERVATIONS.

SECT. I.-Agricultural Societies.

ONE has been lately instituted in Kintyre, and favoured by the Prefident of the Board of Agriculture with a parcel of agricultural reports, which are read with avidity, and may be a means of diffufing knowledge of useful facts, and exciting attention and a fpirit of inquiry.

It might be of fervice to have fuch a fociety in every parish, every member paying a small annual fubfcription, to be applied folely to the purchase of useful books on agricultural fubjects: And as the minifter of the parish is often (what perhaps he ought not to be) a farmer, it might be of fervice, if at a flack feafon of the year, he would give a few weekly lectures on agricultural fubjects, arranging and digefting the moft ufeful hints and improvements that come to light from time to time, fo far as they fuit the place and people of his charge. Those who cannot read themfelves, nor perhaps afford the expence of a subscription, might thus be benefited, and a general spirit of improvement be diffused.

In every county there might be fome perfon connected with the Board of Agriculture, who might receive, digeft, and communicate, any important facts or ufeful difcoveries that might occur in the county, and note down, from time to time, in tables, the measurement of any lands that may be furveyed, the rise or fall in their price, rent, or produce; the changes in the mode of living, price of labour, management of land or cattle, change or improvement of breed, with any