[46] Letters, vol. ii. 28.
[47] Vol. i. p. 124.
[48] Burt, ii. p. 34.
[49] Letters, vol. i. p. 51.
[50] Fraser-Mackintosh’s Antiquarian Notes, p. 1.
[51] “The manners and habits of this parish [as of all other Highland parishes] have undergone a material change within these 50 years; before that period they lived in a plain simple manner, experienced few wants, and possessed not the means, nor had any desire, of procuring any commodities. If they had salt [upon which there was a grievous duty] and tobacco, paid their pittance of rents, and performed their ordinary services to their superiors, and that their conduct in general met their approbation, it seemed to be the height of their ambition.”—Old Statistical Account of Boleskin and Abertarf, Inverness-shire (1798).
[52] Old Statistical Account of Fearn, Ross-shire.
[53] “The spades, ploughs, harrows, and sledges, of the most feeble and imperfect kinds, with all their harnessing, are made by the farmer and his servants; as also the boats, with all their tackle.—The boat has a Highland plaid for a sail; the running rigging is made of leather thongs and willow twigs; and a large stone and a heather rope serve for an anchor and cable; and all this, among a people of much natural ingenuity and perseverance. There is no fulling mill nor bleachfield; no tanner, maltster, or dyer; all the yarn is dyed, and all the cloth fulled or bleached by the women on the farm. The grain for malt is steeped in sacks in the river; and the hides are tanned, and the shoes made at home. There are, indeed, itinerant shoemakers, tailors, wrights, and masons, but none of these has full employment in his business, as all the inhabitants, in some measure, serve themselves in these trades: hence, in the royal boroughs of Inveraray, Campbelton, and Inverness, and in the considerable villages of Crieff, Callander, Oban, Maryburgh, Fort Augustus, and Stornoway, there are fewer tradesmen, and less demand for the workmanship of mechanics, than in any other places of the same size; yet these are either situated in, or are next adjacent to, a more extensive and populous country, than any other similar towns or villages in Scotland.”—Walker’s Hebrides, vol. ii. pp. 374, 5.
[54] Old Stat. Account, vol. ix. pp. 494, 5.
[55] Gartmore Paper, in Burt’s Letters, vol. ii. p. 364.