In Lewis and Harris similar arrangements with regard to stock obtain among the crofters, the amount of stock allowed to each crofter being regulated according to the rent paid.
During the early summer the herds are put at night into enclosures, according to the species, and two tenants, chosen in rotation, keep watch to prevent them from straying over the open fields. If they escape, the watchmen are fined and have to make any damage good, but the fines, and the amount assessed for damages, both go into the common fund.
Early in June, the tillage being finished, the people go to the hill grazing with their flocks. The scene is vividly described by Mr. Carmichael, the general excitement, the men shouting directions, the women knitting and chatting, the children scampering about. Sheep lead the procession, cattle come next, the younger ones preceding the older, the horses follow. Implements and materials are carried to repair the summer huts. When the grazing ground is reached the huts are repaired, fires lit, and food cooked. The people bring forward their stock into an enclosure, and the constable and another man stand at the gate of the enclosure and count each man’s stock separately to see that he has brought only his proper souming. Then the cattle are turned out to graze, and the “Shealing Feast” is celebrated by the singing of hymns and the eating of cheese. The summer huts are of a beehive shape, and are sometimes constructed of stone, and sometimes of turf and frail materials.[85]
- [85] The ruins of beehive huts all over Dartmoor, and of enclosures like Grimspound, are conceivably evidence of similar customs in Devonshire. Now, however, the care of the cattle pastured on Dartmoor by the occupiers of adjacent farms, is a distinct occupation. Those who follow it are called “Moor-men.”
Each tenant under the run-rig system is responsible for his own rent only. Formerly the rent was paid partly in money, partly in meal, partly in butter and cheese, and partly in cattle.
The common functionaries, the shepherd, cattleherd and marchkeeper, are paid by their co-tenants for their services in seaweed, land and grazing. The business of the marchkeeper is to watch the open marches of the townland and prevent trespass. He may also have the duty of watching the shore to see when the seaweed is cast upon it. Then he erects a pole with a bunch of seaweed at the end, and the people come down to the shore to collect the weed for manure. No tenant is permitted to take seaweed till his neighbours arrive, unless the custom prevails of collecting the weed in common, dividing it into shares and casting lots.
When required by the proprietor or the people, the constable convenes a meeting of the inhabitants. At such meetings the questions in dispute are settled, after full discussion, by votes; lots are drawn if the votes are equal.
“The closer the run-rig system is followed, the more are the unwritten customs and regulations observed. The more intelligent tenants regret a departure from them....
“The houses of the tenants form a cluster. In parts of Lewis the houses are in a straight line called Straid, street, occasionally from one to three miles in length. They are placed in a suitable part of the townland, and those of the tenants on the run-rig system are warm, good and comfortable. These tenants carry on their farming operations simultaneously, and not without friendly and wholesome rivalry, the enterprise of one stimulating the zeal of another....
“Not the least pleasing feature in this semi-family system is the assistance rendered by their neighbours to a tenant whose work has fallen behind through accident, sickness, death, or other unavoidable cause....