OF SCOTLAND.

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joining county of Nairn, a great proportion of the farm-ser-vants are unmarried men, hired by the year or half year, andboarded in the houses of the farmers. According to the Statis-tical Account of Scotland, the rates of wages in these countiesat the date of that work, was, for men-servants from L. 6 toL. 8, and for women-servants from L. 2 to L. 3 per annum ;but the price of labour appears to have risen there, about asmuch as in any other part of the kingdom, as from L. 10 toL. 18 a-year is now the current wages; and in some instances,men who can perform all the different operations upon a farm,such as ploughing, sowing, and stacking the corn, receive ashigh as L. 20 per annum , and women-servants have fromL. 5 to L. 6 a-year, with their food always in the farmer’shouse. Fortunately for the interest of agriculture, the prac-tice of employing married servants is spreading in thesecounties, as the large farmers generally have one or two ofthis description, whose wages are from L. 8 to L. 12 of moneyannually, with a cow, six bolls or six and a half bolls of oat-meal, a free house, and a small garden, and their fuel broughthome by the farmer’s horses. Many of the small farmersengage a married servant for nine months, allowing himthree months in the summer to provide his fuel (peats), and tohire as a day labourer. In this case he has a small croft,and a little grass for his cow at night, when she is broughthome from the farmer’s cattle. He begins with assisting tocut down and harvest the corns, and ploughs and performsother farm-work till Whitsunday, when he is again releasedfor other three months. During the nine months that he isa servant, he gets liis breakfast and dinner in the farmer’s'house, and has an allowance in meal for his supper, hiswages being from 1 s. to 2 s. a-day, according to his ability.The system, however, must be wretched where the plough islaid aside for three months in the year, and that at a timewhen the full benefit of good ploughing can best be obtained.

The price of labour appears formerly, to have been lowerin Caithness, than in any other arable district in Scotland ;for, according to the Statistical Accounts, from L. 2 to L. 3