OF SCOTLAND.

251

cured, when the very source from which they should flow is lostto the community. In those districts where married servantsand labourers reside upon the farms, there is scarcely a cottagebut furnishes either a woman, girl, or boy, some of them manymore, who are, during the spring and summer months, al-most constantly in the fields whenever the weather is favour-able. In those situations, then, where the number of cot-tages is so much reduced, the farmers must either draw theirlabourers from towns and villages, or the work, that is thoughtnecessary, and which is performed in the eastern counties,must be entirely neglected. Under the former supposition,it is evident, that a full supply of hands can never be gained;for although male labourers may, and often do go several milesto their work, yet women, boys and girls, are not fond of go-ing to any distance for employment. The latter supposition,therefore, must be the case, so that the author of the Ayr-shire Survey, is perfectly correct when he observes, “ thatproprietors do not seem to perceive, that it is no less theirduty, than it is their interest, to keep up the number, as wellas to ameliorate the condition of labourers in husbandryThroughout the manufacturing districts, together withGalloway and Dumfries shire, both proprietors and tenantshave long felt the bad effects of such narrow minded policy ;for the indigenous cottagers, being either driven from thecountry by neglect, or allured, by false expectations of pro-fit, shut themselves up in loom-shops, or bury themselvesand their children alive in cotton-mills, or other unwholesomemanufactories, where their vigour is impaired, and their mo-rals polluted 5 instead of these, their trusty servants, far-mers have been obliged to employ, at a high rate, indolentand useless vagrants, many of them trained up in vicioushabits, and the very dregs of society.

* Even cottagers liolding immediately of the landlord, are discouraged, fac-tors or land-stewards disliking the trouble of letting them houses, and collectingtheir paltry rents ; while fanners, who are likely to derive benefit from their la-bours, are not friendly to such erections.