(Communicated by Malcolm M'Lennan, Esq., procurator-Fiscal,
Wick.)
White-fishing is but a secondary enterprise at Wick. In the
end of September, annually, a number of boats engage in fishing
for haddocks, and prosecute this fishing till November. This year
fifteen boats engaged in this work, each manned by eight men.
The best boats of the herring fishing fleet are employed, and for
the use of the boat one-ninth part of the proceeds of the fishing is
paid to the boatowner. In local phraseology, the boat is said to be
held by the crew 'on deal,' and the consideration paid for it is 'the
boat's deal.' The average winnings of these boats for the seven
weeks or two months of the haddock-fishing are reckoned at £100,
divisible into nine shares, eight for the crew and one for the boat's
deal. The men hire the boat, and provide each his own lines and
bait.
Before commencing this fishing the fishermen generally agree
with a fish-curer, who binds himself to take all the haddocks
which they catch at a fixed price. This year the rate was 8s. per
cwt. The price is paid in cash each Saturday night of the season.
In the end of November or beginning of December the fishermen
enter into engagements for the cod and ling fishing, then about to
commence. This fishing is prosecuted from December till March,
both months included. This year about 30 boats are engaged in it.
The system pursued is much as in the haddock-fishing. Good
boats are hired by the crews 'on deal,' and the crews supply their
own lines and bait; and having arranged with a fish-curer, deliver
their fish to him as they catch them. The contract is, however,
varied to some extent. The men bargain for 'a bounty ' which is
paid to them in cash at the time of forming the bargain. This year
it ranged from £8 to £12, and the bounty is at once divided by the
crew. The fish are sold not by weight, but at a fixed price for each
fish of a certain standard of length, which this year was fourteen
pence for each fish of sixteen inches. All smaller fish are rejected
by the curers, and are sold by the fishermen in the local markets.
The curers pay cash each Saturday night for fish delivered to them
in course of the preceding week.
Simultaneously with the cod and ling fishing what is known as 'the
winter herring-fishing' is prosecuted. Indeed, the cod and ling
fishing is, in a large measure, dependent on this fishing for
herrings -- fresh herrings being found to be the best bait for cod
and ling. The value of the herrings landed at Wick in course of
December, January, and February in some years has touched
£5000, but generally is very much less. The herrings are sold to
the highest bidder on the arrival of the boats at the harbour, and
paid for in cash on the instant, there being no such contract
concerning them as in the case of white fish.
By the time the cod and ling fishing ceases in March the fishermen
begin preparations for the herring-fishing on the west coast Lewis
and the Hebrides which commences about the middle of May. For
this fishing much the same up of five or six joint-adventurers, each
supplying his share of nets; or, if a less number of partners embark
in it they hire one or more fishermen to complete the crew and of
course, have each a larger share of the profits. Generally they
take with them in their boats their supplies of meal, groceries,
and biscuit, etc. In the west-coast fishing, so far as boats from
Caithness engage in it, the fishermen engage themselves to deliver
all their fish to a curer at an agreed on price per cran, which price
is paid in cash at the end of the fishing, about 1st July. In the
majority of cases the men get an advance of cash from the curers
when fitting out their boats, to the amount of £4 or £5 per man.
Such sums, of course, are deducted from the price of the herrings
in the final settlement.
The Caithness herring-fishing next follows, commencing about
18th July, and lasting till 6th or 10th September. Hitherto
the whole course of the dealings between the fishermen and
fish-curers noticed in this statement has been unexceptionable,
being simply the delivery of fish by the former at agreed on rates
of price, paid by the latter, the curers, in cash at short periods. In
the great Caithness herring-fishing a change of system occurs,
which appears to be mainly owing to the heavy cost of the boats
and material employed, and the heavy sums disbursed by each
boat for labour and maintenance in each season.
A new fishing-boat of the best class costs from £120 to £140,
including sails and rigging complete. A drift of 35 nets (and the
drift often consists of a greater number), at 10s. per net, is value
for £120. A boat well kept is reckoned to stand fourteen years.
The drift of nets is said to require renewal every eight years.
The ordinary case is, that one fisherman is either really or
nominally owner of the boat and drift with which he engages
in this fishing. At least a fisherman actually undertakes the
whole enterprise of the season's fishing with the boat of which
he has possession with all the liabilities attending it. This is,
however, subject to variation, as sometimes two men, and
sometimes but less frequently three men, are the real or nominal
owners of a boat and take the risks of it . Assuming that a man
starts with a new boat and drift free of debt, not only must he have
a capital of about £250 invested in these, but he must be prepared
to undertake further the following charges of the season:--
1 Wages of four hired men (generally
strangers from the Highlands or Islands)
and a boy, ...... £ 30 0 0
2. Their lodgings, ..... 3 0 0
3. Their allowance of meal, .... 4 0 0
4. Cost of barking nets, .... 3 0 0
5. Cartage and drying-green for nets,. . 3 0 0
6. Harbour dues, ..... 1 0 0
44 0 0
But taking into account that accidentally many nets are lost or
destroyed in each year, and that the fishing is prosecuted in boats,
and with nets more or less worn, and that thus there is need of
considerable annual repair and replacement, it will be seen that in
the ordinary case the expense of a fishing season is largely greater
than in the case of an adventure, with a new boat and drift. Thus
the expense, as above, .....
£ 44 0 0
Replacing 4 nets, ..... 14 0 0
Repairing drift, ..... 2 0 0
Repairing and tarring boat, barking ropes,
sails, etc. , ...... 2 0 0
To which falls to be added, to meet
the annual deterioration of the boat 10 0 0
£72 0 0
It follows that the fisherman can have no advantage from the
Caithness herring-fishing unless his boat clears a sum of £ 72, or
thereabout, in which case the surplus over that amount will
constitute his profit.
But if the fisherman has borrowed the money invested in the
boat and nets, it is apparent that his annual burden is increased
by the sum of interest which he must pay for it. And this leads to
reference to a local custom of some importance. If the fisherman
has borrowed the money to purchase his boat and nets, or if, as is
usually the case, he receives them from a fish-curer to whom he
thus becomes debtor for their value, he does so on the condition --
very natural in the circumstances -- that he shall deliver all his fish
to the creditor as long as he remains in debt. In such a case the
price of the herrings is not fixed by contract, but is 'the general
terms' of price conceded by fish-curers to fishermen in their debt;
and these terms are generally about 20 per cent. below the price
paid by the curers to men free of debt, and able to bargain
beforehand concerning it. This is so while interest is charged
on the amount of the debt, or while the fisherman is charged with
'boat's deal' as he usually is, when the debt is not wiped off within
the second year.
For the years 1860-70, the average annual take of herrings was
only 86 crans. The average price is not stated in any tabular form,
but it certainly did not amount to £1 per cran under 'the general
terms' system. Thus, assuming that that portion of the herring
fleet held by fishermen in debt fished its fair average of these
eleven years, it will be seen that the total sum realized but barely
sufficed to meet the necessary outlays of the season, and to pay
interest on the capital involved
This average, however, represents the mean of success and failure.
In every year a few boats fish largely in excess of the average, and
a still larger number fall more or less short of it. The latter lose
money, if they have money to lose. They who have none fall into
debt, or into deeper debt. It is said that fully two-thirds of the
fishermen are in debt, and pursue this extensive enterprise
burdened with all the disadvantages of debt. Their debts range
from all kinds of figures up to £300.
Still there is no such thing as truck; and payment, when payment is
owing, is made in cash. In the case of men free of debt, the price,
being fixed, is at once paid at the close of the fishing, or soon
thereafter. In the case of men in debt, circumstances make the
settlement more complicated. At the outset of his career the
fisherman is desirous of standing as little as possible in debt to his
curer. One or two unsuccessful seasons or seasons of but partial
success quickly change his view and he becomes eager to lay as
much of the burden of the fishing as possible on the fishcurer.
Thus, when he wants nets, he calls on the curer to guarantee
payment to the seller of nets. He gets tar, and cutch, and ropes in
the same way. The curer guarantees payment of the wages, meal,
and other supplies of the crew; and of the cartage of the nets, and
the rent of their drying ground. All these are, of course, debited in
the fisherman's account. Generally the curer pays off all those
claims that require instant settlement at the close of the fishing
season. If things have gone fairly well, he may make the man a
payment in cash at the same time; but the final settlement of the
year is postponed till Martinmas, when, if cash is owing, it is paid.
If no balance accrues to the fisherman, his account is handed to
him; and if he is a crofter, or a reliable man the curer advances to
him £12 or £20, to pay his rent and tide him over the hard times in
winter. Sometimes the curer assists his fishermen debtors by
supplies of meal for their families in winter, the meal being
procured by the curer's orders to millers or meal dealers.
It is tolerably certain that the curer receives an abatement or
discount from the merchant's prices of the meal, goods, ropes,
nets, or other things which the fishermen procure on his
guarantee. But sometimes the guarantee is an open one, with
which the fisherman goes to any merchant he chooses making
the best bargain he can.
Thus the basis of the system in this, the herring-fishing, is also
mainly one of cash payments. On the first relation of it, too, it
seems a system conducted in very liberal ways, inasmuch as the
fish-curers are prompt to supply the capital, or the boat and
materials equivalent to the capital, needed by the fisherman, and
to pay him promptly the whole profits. But this, a thing unusual in
ordinary commercial dealings, lays the system open to suspicion;
and it is, in fact, highly objectionable, and replete with hard and
injurious consequences to the fishermen. Take an ordinary case. A
fisherman has made a lucky fishing with an old boat, and finds
himself at the end of the year clear of debt, or near to that
fortunate condition. He has for years used the old boat, as he
knows, at a serious disadvantage, for the old boat and defective
gearing are insufficient to carry the fisherman twenty or more
miles from shore nightly, and at such distances the shoals of
herrings often are. His curer will give him a boat one year old,
and he takes it, agreeing to pay for it what it originally cost the
curer. If the old boat is worth anything, the curer will take it in
part payment. But thus the fisherman at once becomes debtor in
a £100 or thereby, and bound to fish on 'general terms.' He has
probably been so bound all his fishing career. In the same way, a
fish-curer will readily trust a boat to a smart young fisherman
wishing to start on his own account. Of course, the curer takes
care that he has power by writing to seize the boat again, if
necessary for his security.
It is commonly calculated that few men fish over 100 crans of
herrings oftener than in one season out of five and all the chances
are that our fisherman will do little to reduce his debt for some
years to come. If the price is not paid by a lucky fishing in the first
year, but runs unpaid to a second or third, the curer generally
charges the man with deal for the boat, £10 or £14 as may be, and
this year after year; so that, when at last the price is paid, and the
fisherman gets free, the boat has actually cost him £150 or more.
This, however, only occurs with fish-curers who are of a lower
class than the most respectable. The leading men in the trade
generally credit the sums paid as deal in the final settlement of the
boat's price.
The probabilities are that the fisherman will increase the debt year
after year, for some years. Then the curer takes from him a
sale-note of the boat and of his drift. The boat is beached, so as to
preserve the curer's right to it. The nets are sent to his store. The
generosity of the original transaction disappears. It is, of course,
understood that the boat and nets may be redeemed; but in many
cases interest is added to the debt year after year, the deal is
always charged for the boat, and the fisherman loses about 20 per
cent. of his earnings by the 'general terms.' The sense of failure
operates injuriously on the man, perhaps makes him negligent. He
finds the curer disinclined to increase the debt by an additional
advance of money just when money is most necessary to him for
subsistence, and things go on from bad to worse. At last his year
of luck comes round. He fishes 100 or 120 crans, perhaps 200
crans. His debt is reduced so as to be fairly less than the value of
the boat and drift. Then he may go on for another course of the
same risk and indebtedness. But not unfrequently the curer at this
juncture closes the transaction by retaining and appropriating the
boat and drift, and dismissing the man. The appropriation is made
not seldom without any valuation of the property, and the man is
dismissed without discharge or balancing of the debt.
The disadvantages of this system to the fishermen are apparent,
and are really very great. <First>, Responsibility for the whole
expenses of the fishing is cast upon them, while really the boats
and nets are the fishcurer's. <Second>, They are charged with the
maintenance of these boats and nets, in effect to keep the curer's
capital put into their hands as near to its original value as possible.
<Third>, They pay interest in some cases, and not seldom an
arbitrary profit on part of the capital in form of boat's deal.
<Fourth>, They receive 20 per cent. less for their fish than free
fishermen do.
The disadvantages of the fishermen are the advantages of the
fish-curers. But these advantages are not wholly unmixed. The
fish-curer has not only in the majority of cases to find the boats
and nets, but to disburse all the charges of the fishing where the
proceeds of the catch are insufficient to do it, and 'to keep on'
the fishermen by advances for their food and rents. Thus the
aggregate of the debts is a continual strain on the curer's capital,
and payment is as uncertain as the chances of fishermen
individually getting extraordinary hauls of fish. There is still
further the risk of the debtor dying, in which event the debt is
wholly lost beyond the value of the boat and nets. On the death
of a fish-curer recently, his books were found to contain about
£16,000 of debts due to him by fishermen, and these for the most
part valueless. Still, if the system were not advantageous to the
curers, it is plain that they would not conduct their trade in so
questionable a method.
The fisherman's profits in good years are swallowed up by the
charges and drawbacks of bad and indifferent years, unless happily
there be for him a succession of good years. But, considering how
little the average value of the fishing exceeds the actual outlays of
the year, it is not surprising that this great fishing should be carried
on under a mass of debt, spread over fully two-thirds of the fleet.
It is unquestionably a national misfortune that any great enterprise
like the Caithness herring-fishing should be conducted under such
serious disadvantages, and with such unfortunate results to the
large and adventurous class of men who labour in it.
These results are mainly owing to the great error of the fishermen
in accepting the use of capital on terms unreasonably to their own
disadvantage, standing debtor for the whole charges of the fishing,
and submitting to the large deduction of 20 per cent. on the value
of their fish. But they do it with their eyes open; and it is of
contract, partly expressed and partly understood, and regulated by
local custom. If it were desirable to regulate the arrangements of
the trade by Act of Parliament, and if it were provided (1) that no
person could advance money or money's worth to a fisherman,
with the view of engaging in or equipping him for the fishing,
without thereby constituting himself a partner of the fisherman, to
the extent of such advance, proportionately to the value of the
boat, drift of nets, etc. possessed by the fisherman and used in the
fishing, and becoming liable as such partner for a proportional
share of the charges of the fisherman's adventure, and (2) that the
custom of fixing the price 'by general terms' be abolished; the
trade would, it is thought, soon revert to legitimate methods of
dealing. The real capitalist would share the risks and generally
engross them; while the labour and zeal of the individual
fisherman, who may have only his labour and zeal to give, would
find their value in wages or other remuneration. But it is not to be
denied that any such legislation would be extremely arbitrary and
indefensible in principle.
It should here be stated that what the fishermen earn in
white-fishing, and in the winter and Lewis herring-fishing,
is always paid in cash, irrespective of the debt resting owing
in respect of the Caithness herring-fishing. The individual
debtor of the herring-fishing is lost in the five, six, or eight
joint-adventurers who man the boats in the fishings
first mentioned.
The men who hire themselves as boatmen for the herring-fishing
season bargain for wages to be paid in cash at the end of the
season. These wages vary from £4 to £8, according to the skill or
strength of the boatman. Besides the money wages, these men
have lodgings and cooking of their food supplied to them, and
each receives a stone of meal weekly. The money wage is payable
at the close of the fishing, and is always paid in cash. The number
of men so employed is about 4000 at Wick alone.
These men make their engagements with the boatmasters, who, as
already stated, are ostensibly owners of the boats. They used to
experience much hardship by the failure of the boatmasters to pay
them in bad years. To enforce payment was difficult, for the
fish-curers were invariably found to be the owners of the boats and
nets, the sole possessions of the boatmasters. This has come to be
remedied to a great extent by the men refusing to engage without
receiving a guarantee for payment by the curer.
With regard to coopers, they are engaged for terms longer or
shorter, to make barrels at current wages or rates, and payments
are fortnightly and always in cash.
The women employed in gutting and curing the herring are
engaged for the season. They are paid 6d. per barrel, and 1s. 3d.
a day for repacking and filling up the barrels. 1500 of them may
be employed. The payments are made in cash at the end of the
season.
Thus it will be seen that the whole business of the Caithness
fishings is based on cash payments; and if it were not for the
specialties of the herring-fishing, the whole would be sound and
equitable. These specialties operate so extensive an injury, that
they well merit the attention of the Legislature.
It remains to be noticed that the inducements to engage in the
herring-fishing under all the disadvantages set forth are very great.
It has all the precarious and enticing character of a lottery. Every
year a few lucky men fish large hauls, exceeding £200 in value in
the brief fishing season. As a rule, fishermen marry young; and
how can the young fisherman so easily procure the means or
chance of livelihood as by accepting the boat and nets which
the curer so readily offers? But, apart from any such special
prompting, our fishermen, essentially venturous, all too eagerly
incur the debt and risk a life of indebtedness for the chance of
winning the comparative comfort to which a few, a very few, of
their class attain. I know of no class requiring protection from
their own recklessness in these contracts more than do the
fishermen of Caithness.
III.-- EXTRACTS FROM LETTER FROM REV. MR. ARTHUR,
UYEA SOUND, UNST.
UYEA SOUND, 1<st Feb>. 1872.
I have yours of the 26th Jan. '72, making inquiries about the price
and quality of provisions, etc. in the Fair Isle. When I arrived
there in summer '70, my furniture and provisions I had brought
with me from Edinburgh had not arrived, through the gross
misconduct of Mr. Bruce's skipper; so I had no alternative but to
get provisions from his store, the only shop in the island. Tea,
equal to 2s. or 2s. 2d. a pound in Glasgow, which I had tried from
curiosity, was sold to me for 4s.; sugar (East India brown) worth
31/2d. a pound, cost 7d.; soap, the same; coarse biscuit (the only
bread), 4d. a pound. All these articles were, I conceived, about 100
per cent. above the ordinary selling price, or profits, in other
places. I afterwards bought other articles, but I forget the price,
and could not tell the profits.
Meal is the great demand of the island, besides tea, tobacco, etc. I
heard great complaints of the price of the meal, but I needed none.
They said the bere-meal cost about 20s. a boll, but they did not
know the precise price till settling day, once a year or two years.
Then they had to pay whatever Mr. Bruce chose to name, after it
was all eaten. He kept off the price from that of their fish; and
there too, they had to take whatever he named. I found from an
Orkney newspaper that bere-meal was selling there at 13s. a boll.
As the meal was bought with their own money, and the price of
their own fish of last year, I suppose a penny letter could order 100
bolls, shipped at Aberdeen or Kirkwall; the price of carriage to
Lerwick would be, say 6d. a boll; then conveyed to Fair Isle in Mr.
Bruce's own vessel, with a reasonable freight would clear about
one thousand per cent. on the actual outlay or he would pocket £30
for a penny letter.
The people 'were restricted (as you say you have been informed) to
buy from any one else, both by word and writing, and by the fact
that they had nothing to pay it with till July last from 1869-1871.
Mr. Bruce tried to establish a complete monopoly, but he did not
altogether succeed. Others came and undersold him vastly,
though even they were VERY DEAR, and would not sell above
high- water mark. Every time any one came to the island to sell
tea, sugar, coffee, soap, etc., it was reported that any one buying
from such would get their warning to leave the island--the grand
and only punishment known there. Of course, they all bought
more or less secretly or openly and none were turned away I was
at first astounded to find they did not believe a word I said, and I
soon learned not to believe a word they said. I don't mean all
were liars alike, but only a stranger can't tell whom to trust.
One seller came three times to the island that summer(1870)
and took away a good deal of money and goods each time. I
bought bread, sugar, fowls, etc, for Mr Bruce's laws did not apply
to me Good sugar 6d. a pound, would have cost 5d. and 51/2d.
in Glasgow. Soap equally cheap, I was told. Bread 2d. above
Kirkwall price, <e.g.> a 4 lb. loaf 8d. instead of 6d. at Kirkwall.
This man and his boat's crew of two or three men remained six
days on one occasion in good weather selling and collecting
accounts, and took away cattle, etc. It was in regard to him that
the notice was stuck up in the store window <signed> by Mr
Bruce that he advised his tenants not to deal with strangers, nor to
receive them into their houses.
As to the fish, the people complained that they got 9d. a cwt. less
than those at Sumburgh for the same fish; their prices varying
from 2s. 6d. to 3s., about 25 per cent. below the same article
twenty-four miles distant, so that £75 would pay as much fish
there as £100 at Sumburgh. If the Sumburgh fishermen complain
you may guess what the islanders will do if they dare speak out. I
am told the Unst fishermen have got this year 8s. a cwt. for cod
and ling -- the cod-fish of Fair Isle are bought at half-price. When I
was there for my furniture in July last I asked for curiosity, what
they got for their fish as Mr. Bruce was there settling. They said
2s. 9d. and 3s. that would be 5s 6d. and 6s. for cod. Now 6s. is to
8s. as £75 is to £100. If the fish are not paid till a year or two after
they are delivered, the only capital required is the outlay for salt;
and I should think £20 of salt should serve £200 of clear profit on
the fish -- equal to 1000 per cent. on the outlay as
You may think their plots of ground are let cheap with a view to
profit on the fish. The reverse is the fact. The price of land there
is nearly double that of the lots I have priced in Sutherlandshire
and the rest of Shetland The land is the source of the people's
<loudest> and <bitterest complaints>. They say Mr. Bruce has
doubled the rents since he got the island, four or five years ago and
the tacksmen had overtaxed them before he got it. Many have left
the island since then, on the plea of oppression voluntarily
submitting to the only punishment they have to fear.
.........................................
I received letters in October dated July, and none after till I came
for them in March, although the people were fishing every month
in the year, and we could speak the mail steamer going north twice
in three trips. Going south, she is generally under night or very
early in the morning. I have gone to the mail and spoken to the
captain in October, November and December, and my letters and
papers on board were carried fifty miles past me, to be obtained
when anybody coming to the island chose to ask them; and thus I
might obtain them in a few months, OR NEVER. And so of
letters <leaving> the island. Now, a few pounds could establish a
post-office in the island and the mail steamer could deliver a bag
forty or fifty times in the year when going north; indeed always,
unless she passed in a fog, or in the dark, or in a storm from a
south or south-east wind. In a north wind, the harbour is perfectly
calm, and the island shelters the steamer.
IV.--EXTRACT FROM LETTER BY WM. MOUAT, ESQ. OF
GARTH, ADVOCATE, TO MACCULLOCH, AUTHOR OF 'THE
HIGHLANDS AND WESTERN ISLANDS OF SCOTLAND'
(DISCOVERED AMONGST THE GARTH PAPERS IN MARCH
1872).
<2d November> 1820.
. . . With regard to the points in question, I think, if I can make
myself understood, I should be able to satisfy you; but our mode
of holding, or rather of describing property, is so different from
anything practised either in England or Scotland, that I suspect it
will be necessary to take a very elementary view before I can be
sure of succeeding.
In the first place, then, there are no <Manorial rights>, or anything
analogous to them, either in the person of Lord Dundas or of any
other person. The reason why you have heard his Lordship
spoken of as so universal a proprietor in the commons is, that
although his is only a third or fourth rate property, it is so much
scattered, that there are few commons (scattales or scattholes) in
the country in which he has not something to say, <simply,
however, as a proprietor>. The Crown is the universal superior,
and all the land is freehold. It is true that Lord Dundas lately
possessed over all the country, and does still possess over
some few estates, the right to the Crown rents. These were the
feu-duties exigible from the feued lands, and a payment called
scatt, exigible both from Udal and feued land; but this was simply
a right to collect the payments, and did not infer any right of
superiority. Etymologically, scatt certainly seems to have some
connection with <scattholds>, but practically it has none
whatever, so far as the receiver is concerned, and is as to him
simply a feu-duty. The opinion of the country, however, is so far in
favour of the etymological view, that it is generally conceived that
all towns (<i.e.> townships) paying scatt have right to a share of
the commons, while those who do not have none; but this point
has never been settled by any judicial authority.
In the second place, you are mistaken in supposing that tenants
pay no rent for the scattholds. Every township its own scatthold,
the boundaries of which are, or ought to be, known. I say 'ought
to be,' because I believe in many instances a knowledge of the
marches has been lost. Any scatthold, therefore, is common
merely as respects the township to which it belongs; and it is the
exclusive property of the owners of that township, or, more strictly
speaking, forms a part of the township itself. Each township
consists of a certain number of merks. The following history of
the origin of this term (which is our universal denomination of
land, both in letting it to tenants and in conveying it from one
proprietor to another) may help to explain its nature. It seems,
then, to have arisen in the times when rents were fixed by public
authority, each township being valued, <in cumulo>, at so many
merks of money as it was considered worth. The share of each
landlord was then naturally said to consist of so many merks,
because the rent was in fact his whole interest, the farmer being,
according to the old Danish law, the real proprietor, and the
landlord only a sort of lord of the manor. The term, by a very
easy change, came, with the changes of laws, to apply to that
portion of land which had originally paid a money merk of rent,
but did not, and does not to this day, denote any particular spot or
measurement, but merely such proportion of the whole township
as had been equivalent to one money merk of rent, when the whole
was valued at a given number. This hypothesis, for I acknowledge
it is little more, at least gives a result corresponding precisely to
our present idea of a merk of land, and also accounts for the great
variety of contents which we find in merk, since, to be equal in
value, they must have been of very different extent in different
situations. The number of merks in each town is known from old
records and traditions, or, practically, from the sum of all the
proprietors. Thus, if in the town of M. 40 merks belong to A., 30
to B., and 20 to C., then is M. a town of 40 + 30 + 20 = 90 merks.
It is of no consequence here whether M. contains five acres or five
hundred, 40-90ths of the whole belong to A., and 30-90ths to B.,
etc. And, on the other hand, the number of merks might be
double, triple, or in any other proportion, without at all altering
the extent or state of the property, except that the interest of each
proprietor would be expressed by proportionally higher figures.
A. would have 80-180ths, B. 60-180ths, and so forth. In these
circumstances, if a landlord lets to a tenant any given number of
merks, it is just giving him a fractional share, of which the total
number of merks in the town is the denominators, and the number
let the numerator. A tenant taking ten merks in the above
supposed town of M., would just have right to 10-90ths of the
corn land, 10-90ths of the meadow land, 10-90ths of the stinted
pasture within the dyke, and 10-90ths of the unstinted pasture, or
'scatthold,' without the dyke. But the rent is charged at so much
per merk -- <Ergo>, the tenant does pay rent for the scatthold,
Q.E.D.!!
I do not, however, allege that the rent thus paid is anything like
what it might easily be under a better system.
That the rents were anciently fixed by public authority, is, I
believe, an established fact, and there is reason to believe that
the practice continued long after the transference of this country
from Norway to Scotland, when, of course, it ceased to be law.
This practice, and the long period for which both rents and
improvements were stationary, had produced so strong an
impression upon our habits of thinking on this subject, that, at
so late a period as to be distinctly within my own recollection,
landlords, in general, had no clear practical confidence in their
own right to demand a direct rise of rent, and, under this feeling,
resorted, in many instances, to indirect methods of doing that
which they had a right to have done openly and avowedly.
The sight of this sort of thing, without an understanding of the
circumstances and habits of thinking which lie to it, gave
superficial observers an idea that much oppression and injustice
was exercised towards the tenantry, and produced much of that
obloquy (some of which may possibly have fallen in your way)
which has been thrown upon the Shetland landholders.
This idea has now, however, completely vanished, and many
Shetland proprietors have let their lands at a raised money rent,
without reserving any further claim upon the tenants: and if all
have not done so, it arises from other causes, and not from any
feeling of the kind described above, or from any inclination to
take undue advantages.
As to your question why the scattholds remain undivided, the
general backwardness of improvement, and want of agricultural
skill and capital, are the immediate causes. The present tenantry
are so ignorant of the means of turning these commons to any
proper account, that the fee-simple of most of them would, under
the present management, hardly pay a common land-measurer for
surveying them, far less could they bear any litigation. There are,
however, many considerable scattholds at present the exclusive
property of one or a few persons. Improved management has
begun, and will probably take root, first in such situations, and
afterwards, when its advantages are seen, and a sufficient number
of people trained to practise it has arisen, it will spread over those
lands where the difficulty and expense of divisions have to be
previously incurred. Your alternative of levying a rent of so much
per head of beasts pasturing, would not answer, because, as I have
already endeavoured to explain, the tenants, in paying a rent per
merk, pay for their scattholds as well as for their other ]and.
Your other suggestion, however, numerically limiting the stock
according to the rent, or, which is the same thing, according to the
moths, would be highly beneficial both to tenants and landlords. If
you ask, Why then is it not carried into effect? I can only answer
that we have not long turned our attention the way of agricultural
improvement, and have only begun to discover that what is
difficult is not always impossible.
V. -- EXCERPT FROM REPORT OF MR. PETERKIN, GENERAL INSPECTOR OF BOARD
SUPERVISION OF THE POOR IN SCOTLAND.
<Shop Dealings with Paupers>.--The Board are aware of the
constantly recurring reference I have had to make for many
years to the tendency of Inspectors and members of Parochial
Boards, here and there, over the whole of Scotland, to traffic
with paupers, by furnishing them with goods of all kinds, and
with lodgings, and intercepting the parochial allowances in
payment thereof. On this subject there has, since the institution
of the Board, been a constant struggle; for here and there, all
over Scotland, in the large towns as well as in rural and remote
parishes, the practice prevailed, and was occasionally discovered--
generally by accident. The Board long ago expressed decided
opinions on the impropriety of the practice. Now in Shetland, it
so happens that almost the only persons who are practically the
administrators of the Poor Law are more or less directly or
indirectly interested in the local trade -- in the fish-curing, or in
the shops, or in the stores of one kind or another. In one parish
the Poor Law is practically administered by these merchants and
fish-curers, and to their shops the paupers must of necessity go to
make their purchases. In two other parishes nearly the same thing
occurs. There is probably no parish in Shetland, where, to a
greater or less extent, this is not the case; and to find there persons
capable of transacting business, and of acting as members of
Boards or Inspectors of Poor, who are not, in some way or other,
directly or indirectly interested in a shop, or connected with a
shopkeeper, is perhaps impossible. Where the line is to be drawn,
when all interest in the business of the shop will cease, is beyond
my powers of discovery. Even among the more recent
appointments of Inspectors we have one who is personally
unobjectionable, having no shop; but his mother keeps "<the
shop>" of the district. Another was a shopkeeper; and on his
appointment as Inspector he gave up his shop and goods, and with
them, of course, it was to be supposed all interest in the business;
but he made them all over to his niece, <a girl fifteen>! And the
third, having ceased to keep a shop, acts as agent for his brother and
his partners, who have shops and stores and curing stations; but at
present he sells nothing. These three men seem to me in
themselves to be really as competent as can be for their duties, and
are, I believe, as good and efficient men as can be found in their
respective parishes. In another parish we have as an Inspector the
paid shopman or servant of the firm who has "<the store>." In
another parish the chairman of the Board has "<the shop>," and
his brother has "<the other shop>." In short, everything in
Shetland gravitates towards "<the shop>." To it the child takes a
dozen eggs in a morning, and obtains for the family breakfast what
is called a "<corn o' tea>;" to it the young woman takes her
knitted hosiery, and in exchange will receive either tea or some
article or material of dress; to it the pauper takes the pass-book, or
pay-ticket of the parish, and on that guarantee will get the "<corn
o' tea>," or the "<corn o meal>;' and he who supplies the goods
over the counter is almost certain to be a member of the Board, or
a near relative of one who is, or of the Inspector, -- he may even be
the chairman of the Board himself.
'I do not pretend to be able to offer any suggestions to remedy such
a state of matters, but too rely state the facts as they have come
under my observation. I have, however, no doubt that the poors'
rates in Shetland are, to a great extent, but the natural results of
such parochial arrangements as I have referred to.'
VI.--NOTES OF PRICES PAID BY JAMES METHUEN, LEITH, FOR (CURED) SALT
FISH, FREE ON BOARD AT LERWICK, FROM 1853 TO 1871.
Year Ling Cod Tusk Saith
1853 £20, 10s. £18 £20. 10s. £10. 10s.
1854-5 .... .... .... ....
1856 .... £15 .... £11, 10s. to £12
1857 £21 to £22 £18 to £17 £19, 5s. £12, 10s.
1858 £21, 10s. £16, 10s. .... £12
1859 £20 to £22 £15, 10s. .... £10 to £11
1860 £19 to £21 £17. 15s £20 £13
1861 £18 to £17, 10s. £17, 10s. £18 £12 to £13
1862 £17 to £18 £15 to £16 £17 £8, 10s.
1863 £18 to £20, 10s. £18 £20 £9
1864 £18 to £21 £17 to £19 £21, 5s. £12
1865 £23 to £24 £21 to £22 £23 £15
1866 £23 to £25, 10s. £19 to £23 £24 £13, 10s.
1867 £17 to £18 £16 £17 £7
1868 £18 to £19 £16 .... ....
1869 £20 to £20, 10s. £17 £18, 10s. £11
1870 £21, 10s. to £22 £18 £20 ....
1871 £22, 10s. to £24 £20 .... £13, 10s.