8134. At these sales, are many of the cattle purchased [Page 199] by the merchants?-A good many. With reference to my former statement, that £327 is the rent of the four shops, I wish to explain that that is much short of what it should be. It is nearly £450 for the four; and my explanation of that is, that Mr. Adie has got a large park in connection with his premises, and Mr. Inkster and Mr. Anderson have the same at Brae and Hillswick, and they all require to buy extensively for their parks.
8135. Are you acquainted with the practice in this country of a creditor marking cattle, and holding them as a kind of security for debt?-Yes.
8136. Is that a common thing here?-I don't know if it is common; but I have known several cases where it has been done.
8137. I suppose that where a merchant does that it is not held to interfere with the landlord's hypothec or his rent?-No. The rents are generally paid before the merchants interfere in any way with the cattle.
8138. But when a merchant interferes with cattle in that way, or purchases them in at a sale, he buys them of course subject to the landlord's right?-If he buys them at a sale, he buys them direct off, and pays the money for them; but if he secures the animal privately, it generally remains with the party until it is taken away. In a transaction of that kind, the animal is priced, and it is removed at a convenient time for both parties. It does not come to a public sale at all.
8139. The animal, in that case, is retained by the tenant?-It is marked and priced and retained by the tenant, and taken over by the purchaser when he wants it.
8140. The cattle are priced the time they are pledged, or marked as it were?-I believe they are.
8141. Is that an arrangement between the merchant and the tenant?-Entirely.
8142. And they arrange the price between themselves, or does the merchant put the price on the cattle?-I think it is a mutual arrangement, because there is much competition for cattle, that the merchant must do that.
8143. Do you think there is any understanding between the merchants, that when a marked beast is exposed at any one of these periodical sales, the other merchants shall not bid against the merchant for whom the animal has been marked, but that it shall be knocked down to him?-I believe that very few of the marked animals are ever exposed at the sales, but I have known them exposed in some cases. I have known cattle being marked in that way, or pledged to Mr. Inkster at Brae; and if brought to the sale, they would have been entered in his name or in the name of the party who brought them, and the sellers would have got the full price.