| 1502. | Crown Rental | £757 | 3 | 4 | ||||
| 1540. | By a rise of prices— | |||||||
| Crown | £1382 | 10 | 0 | |||||
| Bishopric | 1251 | 2 | 6 | |||||
| Rental at the visit of James V. | 2633 | 12 | 6 | |||||
| 1568. | By a farther rise of prices— | |||||||
| Crown | £6366 | 10 | 0 | |||||
| Bishopric | 4381 | 2 | 6 | |||||
| Lord Robert Stewart’s first Rental | £10,747 | 12 | 6 | |||||
| 1592. | By a rise of quantity, weight, and price— | |||||||
| Crown | £9016 | 0 | 0 | |||||
| Bishopric | 9000 | 0 | 0 | |||||
| Earl Robert’s final Rental | 18,016 | 0 | 0 | |||||
| 1600. | By farther rise of quantity, weight, and price— | |||||||
| Crown | £25,650 | 0 | 0 | |||||
| Bishopric | 19,215 | 0 | 0 | |||||
| Earl Patrick’s Rental of Orkney | 44,865 | 0 | 0 | |||||
I am not aware of any authentic Rental of the burdens of Zetland during the sixteenth century, except the statement in the Charter to Maitland and Bellenden (1587), and the Comptroller’s Accounts (1588), after twenty years of Earl Robert’s aggravations of weight, measure, and value, when a third had been added to the contents of every Pack of Wadmæl and Lispund of Fat-gude at arbitrary conversions in a coinage as arbitrary. The nominal quantities (for which the Donatary compounded with the Royal Comptroller at £400) are there stated as follows:—
| Wadmæl, 167 Packs (of 60 Cuttels) at 6d. per Cuttel | £250 | 10 | 0 | |
| Butter and Oil, 1530 Lispunds at 12s. per Lispund | 918 | 0 | 0 | |
| Wattel, commuted at 105 Dollars at 30s. each | 157 | 10 | 0 | |
| Tolls, &c., 120 Angel-Nobles (at £4) and 20 Dollars | 510 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total Rental accounted for by the Donataries | £1836 | 0 | 0 | |
But by the augmented Weight, Measure, and Price, the burdens actually extorted from the Lordship of Zetland were raised (exclusive of Ox-money and other unacknowledged exactions) to the amount and value of—
| Wadmæl, 167 Packs (of 80 Cuttels) at 2s. per Cuttel | £1336 | 0 | 0 | |
| Butter, 2040 Lispunds at 18s. 8d. | 1904 | 0 | 0 | |
| Wattel, 105 Dollars at 36s. each, with other augmentations | 210 | 0 | 0 | |
| Tolls, &c. | 2000 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total actual burdens of Zetland | £5450 | 0 | 0 | |
From these Abstracts of the Revenues of the Crown Estate and Bishopric of Orkney and of the Lordship of Zetland, the income drawn from the Islands by Earl Patrick, exclusive of a multitude of unacknowledged exactions, may be approximately stated thus—
| Orkney— | Crown Skatts, Duties, and Males | £25,650 | 0 | 0 | |||
| Bishopric Rents and Teinds | 19,215 | 0 | 0 | ||||
| Tolls, Customs, Admiralty, Justiciary, &c. (about) | 6,000 | 0 | 0 | ||||
| Total Revenue of Orkney. | £50,865 | 0 | 0 | ||||
| Zetland— | Skatts, Males, Tolls, &c. | 5,450 | 0 | 0 | |||
| Total Revenues of Earl Patrick | [[3]]£56,315 | 0 | 0 |
[3]. About £5000 Sterling—a princely revenue in those days, when the general scarcity of coin, and poverty of kings and kingdoms had been met by a debasement of the coinage gradual and universal; but in Scotland so rapid, that the £ Scots, equivalent to the £ English in 1366, was worth only 8s. in 1468—6s. 8d. in 1540—3s. 4d. in 1568—and 1s. 8d. in 1600.
The peculation of subsequent Donataries, by the fraudulent increase, fluctuation, and complexity of the Standards of Weight and Measure, and consequent augmentation of the burdens of Orkney to the amount of 3000 Cattle, 5000 Bolls of Grain, 6218 Lispunds or Stones of Butter, and 700 Gallons of Oil, became (1750) the subject of the memorable PUNDLAR PROCESS. To the various Memorials and Pleadings in that suit I must refer for more minute details, as the whole difficult subject is there discussed and exhausted, but in a form too long for insertion, and too intricate for condensation. The evidence was complete, that the Crown Donataries had for two centuries persistently, fraudulently, and enormously increased the legal weights and measures of the Islands. But after the Pursuers had been driven to incur the expense of this elaborate proof, a decision was given against them on the merely preliminary plea of prescription, to the disgrace of a corrupt or partial Court. With such Judges even the specific evidence of date, place, and person, now added by the complaints, might have had little weight; perhaps they might have obsequiously convicted the Zetland witnesses against Lawrence Bruce, of Conspiracy against “that worthy man.”