188

LAND OCCUPIED BY FARMERS

drilled turnips. Mr Arbuthnot, a native of Scotland , whoresided at Mitcham in Surry, and afterwards went to Ireland ,is considered by Mr Arthur Young , as the best cultivator ofstrong arable land, and indeed the best general farmer thathe ever met with, in the course of his long experience. MrCurwen of Workington-Hall, in Cumberland, who had travel-led over England as well as Scotland , in search of agriculturalinformation, declares, that the beauty and the regularity ofthe crops, and the extreme cleanness of the fallows in East-Lothian , struck him more than any thing he had ever beforebeheld in any other country ; that he does not know a farmerwho may not learn something in that district; that in regardto excellence of soil and management, it exceeded every thinghe had ever witnessed in any other part of Great Britain , and. though it costs him much to own it, that he despairs of beingever able to attain an equal degree of perfection. He adds,where all are so excellent, any discrimination would be invi-dious *.

Let this suffice for a general description of the characterof Scottish farmers, a more particular account of which willbe found in the Appendix , NO. II.

Sect. 3. — Leases.

The general prevalence of leases, in the best cultivated dis-tricts of Scotland , is the chief cause of the improvementsin Scottish agriculture; and indeed, without the encourage-ment which they afford, the land must in many cases haveremained in a state of nature, or it must have been improvedat the expence of the proprietors. If all seasons were equal-ly favourable, if all farms were completely cultivated, anduniformly fertile, and if the produce of the soil always fetch-ed the same price, leases would be less essential; but as thereis a great diversity in regard to all these circumstances,leases become absolutely necessary, both for promoting the im-

Address to the Workington Society, An. 1810.