Sc?, /oS PUBLICATIONS OF THE SCOTTISH HISTORY SOCIETY THIRD SERIES VOLUME XXVII SURVEY OF LOCHTAYSIDE 1769 1936 SURVEY OF LOCHTAYSIDE 176 9 Edited with an Introduction by MARGARET M. MCARTHUR, M.A., LL.B. EDINBURGH Printed at the University Press by T. and A. Constable Ltd. for the Scottish History Society Printed in Great Britain PREFACE I desire to express my gratitude to the Right Honourable the Earl of Breadalbane, M.C., for his kindness in affording me every facility for studying his estate papers, both those deposited in H.M. General Register House, Edinburgh, and those in the Breadalbane Estate Office, Killin, and for the interest which he has shown in the work of editing this volume. I desire also to thank Professor W. R. Scott, M.A., D.Phil., Litt.D., LL.D., F.B.A., for his kindness in reading the proofs of my Introduction and for the encouragement he has given me in my research. To Mr. W. Angus, Keeper of the Registers and Records of Scotland, to Mr. Henry Paton, Curator of Historical Records, and to the staff of the Historical Department of H.M. General Register House, Edinburgh, my thanks are extended for the creation of the very pleasant atmosphere in which I have worked and for numerous acts of kindness and assistance. Margaret M. McArthur. INTRODUCTION The documents published in this volume represent the written part and two of the plans of a Survey of the Bread- albane estates lying on the north side and on the south side of Loch Tay, made in 1769 for the third Earl of Breadalbane by two land surveyors, John Farquharson, who surveyed the north side, and John McArthur, who surveyed the south side of the loch. Most of the documents printed in this volume were discovered by the editor among the Breadalbane Estate Papers deposited in H.M. General Register House, Edin- burgh, while the remainder were found as the result of a search which the Earl of Breadalbane very kindly con- sented to have made in his estate office at Killin. All these manuscripts are appearing in print for the first time. There is, indeed, a lamentable lack of printed sources available for a study of agricultural operations and the status of the agricultural population in the eighteenth century, before the Government evinced its interest in Scottish agriculture by establishing the Board of Agriculture and making public a knowledge of the con- ditions existing at the end of the eighteenth century. The Reports published by the Board of Agriculture in 1794 make some attempt to describe the agricultural conditions previously existing in Scotland, but the accounts are necessarily superficial by reason of the method employed in their compilation, for a reporter made a tour of a district, observed the existing situation and gathered some information from the inhabitants as to what had Vll viii SURVEY OF LOCHTAYSIDE previously happened. His real business being to describe conditions in the ’nineties with a view to suggesting improvements, he had naturally little interest in the agricultural history of the district under consideration. Indeed Marshall, who reported on the Central Highlands, even thought that a detailed description of the management of the small farms in 1794 ‘ would be ill-placed in this Report; it belongs,’ he said, ‘ rather to the Antiquary to record that such a state of husbandry once existed.’1 More- over, the Old Statistical Accounts, though written by persons perhaps more interested in the past than the reporters to the Board of Agriculture, were mainly written after the Reports, and probably borrowed material from them, the writer of the Account of Kenmore, in fact, referring the reader to Marshall.2 Nor by comparing ‘ backward ’ districts with those into which more advanced methods had been by 1794 introduced, can we construct a series of pictures showing the evolution of Scottish agriculture, for there was by no means a uniform system throughout Scotland, which merely developed at different rates in different parts through the various stages which have been called ‘ the agricultural revolution.’ Thus our Survey furnishes information regarding Scottish agriculture in the Highland district which geographically is practically the centre of Scotland, at a period with which published sources do not deal. While many estate surveys were carried out, the manu- scripts of the Lochtayside Survey of 1769 appear to be unique. The editor has been unable to find else- where in Scotland any documents comparable to them. Even the manuscripts and maps dealing with the Forfeited Estates have nothing similar to offer, though there is 1 Wm. Marshall, General View of the Agriculture of the Central Highlands of Scotland (1794), P- 39- 2 Statistical Account (1791-9). vol. xvii. p. 464. INTRODUCTION ix one beautiful map of Drummond property in Perthshire, executed by Will. Winter in 1753.1 Of course, it is perhaps to be expected that the Earl of Breadalbane, whose estates probably exceeded in extent and con- tiguity those of any subject in Europe,2 should have elaborate surveys executed, which in their wealth of detail and careful workmanship surpass any others which have come to light; yet even among the Breadalbane Estate Papers there are no documents at all comparable to those of the 1769 Survey, though many surveys were made at various times of different parts of Breadalbane. Most of the surveys made were carried out to facilitate the settle- ment of disputes regarding boundaries between the Breadalbane and other estates. There was, for example, a prolonged dispute regarding the boundaries of the Royal Forest of Mamlorne, of which the Earl of Breadalbane was Hereditary Keeper by virtue of a Charter of 1694, and a survey of the forest was made in 1736 when the Earl and His Majesty’s Advocate on behalf of the Crown fought a case in the Court of Session regarding the forest marches against James Menzies of Culdares and Angus McDonald of Kenknock, whose properties adjoined the forest. There are, too, various written reports concerning small parts of the estate, but if any surveys were ever made like those of 1769, they have not, apparently, survived the vicissitudes of centuries. The Survey of 1769 was carried out at considerable cost. Farquharson and McArthur each took about ten months to complete his part of the work, while at the same time another surveyor, A. Shepherd, was engaged in surveying other parts of the Breadalbane estates. The following account was submitted by Farquharson :— 1 1 Forfeited Estates Papers, H.M. General Register House, Edinburgh. Wm. MarshaU, op. cit., p. 23. SURVEY OF LOCHTAYSIDE To surveying the north side of Loch Tay from April 8th to Septr 18th at 10/- per day £ 70 To money given the chainmen 1 £ 6 19 To 18 weeks planning £ 54 £130 19 Received at sundries £ 35 £ 95 19 The account was paid and receipted on May 25, 1770. McArthur’s account was paid and receipted on April 12, 1770, and was as follows :— To surveying the south side of Loch Tay 146 days at 10/- £ 73 To making a plan more than bargon 2 90 days at 10/- per day £ 45 To paying of chainmen their wages at 6d per day £ 7 6 To expense of paper, books and upholstery work £ 1 16 £127 Received at sundry times £ 55 Ballance due The John McArthur of the Survey of 1769 is probably the man who made the well-known map of Glasgow in 1778 and of whom nothing is known save what is contained in two entries in the Records of the Burgh of Glasgow. In view of the amount he was paid for his work in 1769 by the Earl of Breadalbane, the price at which the City of Glasgow purchased copies of McArthur’s map may seem small, but 1 The workmen referred to were ‘ labourers,’ paid at the usual rate for day labourers, namely sixpence. They carried and laid out the measuring instruments,2 and derived their name from the surveying chains. M°Arthur had evidently not been asked at first to make a plan. INTRODUCTION xi evidently copies of the map of Glasgow were expected to be sold, while there would not be a demand for copies of the Breadalbane map. The entry in the Burgh records regarding the map, dated October 5, 1778, is as follows :— ‘ A plan of the city of Glasgow made out by John McArthur, land surveyor in Glasgow, with a letter from him thereanent being produced, and the said letter being read and the plan inspected by the magistrates and councill, they authorise the lord provost in name of the city to subscribe for ten copys of the said plan to be kept in the clerks chamber, the price thereof amounting to five pounds five shillings sterling. And remitt to the dean of guild and his bretheren, on account of the said plan, to enter and receive the said John McArthur as a burgess and guild brother of the city and to remitt his fine.’1 It appears from this entry that John McArthur was not a native of Glasgow. The other reference to his work is in an entry on November 7, 1782, instructing the Master of Works to get a dozen of McArthur’s maps of the City of Glasgow, so coloured as to point out the bounds of each separate parish in the city, and to give one to each of the city ministers.2 If McArthur’s and Farquharson’s accounts seem high,3 however, Shepherd, who had during the same summer been surveying other parts of the estates, submitted an account so large that he perhaps thought it called for some explanation, or, more likely, some comment on its amount had been made by John Campbell of Achallader, the Earl’s Chamberlain in Breadalbane.