Public notice by printed bills was given of all meetings, and circulars were also sent to all clergymen, schoolmasters, and landed proprietors, and to all persons in the fishcuring and hosiery trades. Evidence was received from almost all who tendered it, from a large number of persons suggested or put forward by employers of labour and purchasers of hosiery goods and fish, and from many witnesses who were selected and cited.
________________________
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF SHETLAND.
The Shetland Islands are upwards of a hundred in number, varying in size from the Mainland, which is about seventy miles in length and thirty at its greatest breadth, to small rocks not even affording pasturage to sheep. The outlines of all the islands, as shown on the accompanying map are very irregular, long bays or voes indenting them so deeply that no point is more than three miles from the sea. The country is hilly, but none of the [Page 2 rpt.] hills are very lofty. Twenty-eight of the islands are inhabited; some of the smaller islands containing only two, or in some cases only one family. The population in 1861 was 31,670, viz. 18,617 females, and 13,053 males. The population in 1871 was 31,605, viz. 18,525 females, and 13,080 males. The census is taken at a time of the year when many men who are sailors in the merchant service are absent from their homes, which they visit once a year or oftener. At the last census there were 6,494 families, 5,740 inhabited houses, 220 vacant houses, and 10 houses building.
The Agricultural Returns for Great Britain for 1871 state the number of occupiers of land in Shetland, from whom returns have been obtained, at 3992, occupying on an average thirteen acres each. The total acreage under all kinds of crops, bare, fallow, and grass, is given as 50,454 acres in 1870, and 50,720 in 1871, of which, in the latter year, 11,626 acres were under corn crops, 3,493 under green crops (2,909 being potatoes), 522 under clover and grasses under rotation, and 33,227 permanent pasture, meadow, or grass not broken up in rotation, exclusive of heath or mountain land. The total number of horses returned to the Statistical Department, as on 25th June 1871, was 5,354; of cattle 21,735; of sheep, 86,834; and of pigs, 5,251. _________________
SOCIAL STATE.
The 'toons,' or townships, in which the peasantry of Shetland live, are generally situated along the margins of the voes, or far-stretching inland bays which intersect the country; and although in some districts they extend into the valleys running into the interior, they are almost always within a short distance from the sea. It is natural, therefore, that the Shetlander should be a fisherman or a sailor; and for two centuries it appears that he has generally combined the occupations of farming and fishing. The following description of the rural polity of Shetland, taken from Dr. Arthur Edmonstone's View of the Ancient and Present State of the Zetland Islands (2 vols. 8vo, Edin. 1809), is for the most part applicable at the present day.
'The enclosed land in Zetland is divided into what are called merks and ures. A merk, it is said, should contain 1600 square fathoms, and an ure is the eighth part of a merk; but the merks are everywhere of unequal dimensions, and scarcely two are of the same size. The oldest rentals state the number of merks to be about 13,500, and those of the present time make them no more. A considerable portion, however, of common has been enclosed and cultivated since the appearance of the first rentals, although not included in them. When a part of the common is enclosed and farmed, the enclosure is called an outset; but the outsets are never included in the numeration of merks of rental land. From these circumstances it is very difficult to ascertain the actual quantity of cultivated ground in Zetland.
'The enclosures are made, generally, in the neighbourhood of the sea, and contain from 4 to 70 merks, which are frequently the property of different heritors, and are always subdivided among several tenants. Such place is called a town or a room, and each has a particular name.
'The uncultivated ground outside of the enclosure is called the scatthold, and is used for general pasture, and to furnish turf for firing. Every tenant may rear as many sheep, cattle, or horses, on the general scatthold attached to the town in which his farm lies as he can. There is no restriction on this head, whether he rent a large or a small farm. If there be no moss in the scatthold contiguous to his farm, the tenant must pay for the privilege to cut peat in some other common, and this payment is called <hogalif.> It seldom exceeds 3s. per annum.