13,544. Was it some time after you came back from Liverpool that you were settled with?-No; it was in the same week or the week after.
13,545. Had you seen Mr. Irvine after you came back and before you settled with him?-Yes.
13,546. Was it when you first came back that he asked you to go to Faroe in the following season?-It was at the time when I settled, and also when I joined the vessel.
13,547. Do you think if you had not refused to go in one of Messrs. Hay's vessels to the Faroe fishing you would have been charged with peat leave?-I don't know about that.
13,548. Is the charge for peats just so much for each fire that is burned?-We don't know; it is just included in the rent.
13,549. Is it not charged separately from the rent?-No; it is all put together, so far as I know; it is all called land-rent.
13,550. Have you any note of your settlement with Mr. Irvine in 1866?-No. I don't think I got any receipt then; but I got a receipt yesterday when I paid the half-year's rent.
13,551. I suppose the people in Burra were quite at liberty to go to the Faroe fishing with any person they pleased during the last twelve years?-No, some of them were not at liberty, but I was at liberty because I had charge of a vessel. A single man who was not master of a vessel did not have liberty.
13,552. How do you know that?-Because I have been told of tenants who had to pay £1 in consequence of their sons going to the Faroe fishing. Andrew Laurenson paid £1 for going to Faroe in Messrs. Harrison's employ, and he has not got it back. I don't know any one else who has not got the money back except him; but there may be others who had to pay it, and who have not got it back.
13,553. Were a number of the young men obliged to go to the fishing in Hay & Co.'s vessels?-A good few of them went in their vessels, and some of them left and went in the vessels of other owners.