OF SCOTLAND.

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in some of the Highland counties, or tethered on the patchesof ley which were intermixed with the land in tillage, orbarely supported on thistles and other weeds, which the mi-serable husbandry of those days supplied in great abundance.During summer they were occasionally employed in carry-ing home peats and turfs for fuel, and afterwards the coarsebog-liay, which was the only kind of hay then known; andthe labours of the season terminated with harvesting thecrop. From that time, till the plough was set a-going againin spring, the horses, like their owners, indulged themselves,with few interruptions, in the luxury of idleness and pover-ty. In this state of husbandry oxen bore a large share ofthe labour of almost every farm; cattle were to be reared atany rate, and could not be fattened in those times till theyhad reached an advanced age; they could perform, in theinterim, a certain quantity of labour without corn; and incase of accidents, the loss was not nearly so great upon oxenas upon horses.

I. It would occupy too much room, to describe the gra-dual changes which an improved system of cultivation intro-duced into the labours of agriculture, from the old arrange-ment of outfield and infield, till the establishment of alternateand convertible husbandry in the south-eastern counties.The several stages of the progress arc still to be seen both inthe western and northern districts. It will be sufficient inthis place to mention generally the labour performed byhorses throughout the year, according as the soil is adapted tothe growth of turnips, or requires the periodical interventionof a summer-fallow.

1. The several rotations of crops best adapted to turnipsoils have been fully described in the chapter on arable land;the most common one is that in which grass, (clover and rye-grass), and turnips, are taken alternately with wheat, oats,and barley,—the land being sown with grass- seeds, with thecrop immediately following turnips, and the grass cut for hay