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always for pernicious articles of consumption. A dishonest tenant often drains from the landlord's store those resources which ought to be reserved for the support of the honest in time of need, and he returns to the landlord as little as he possibly can, the landlord not being always able to distinguish the pretences of the designing from the real necessities of the unfortunate till after dear bought experience. If ever complaints are heard from the Zetland tenantry, it is from those who in this manner of ten grievously oppress both their landlord and their fellow-tenants.

All money rents ought to be abolished, and the rents made payable wholly in the most common productions of the country; for those, while the landlords are resident, and the exporters of the produce of their own estates, are the most convenient articles for the tenant to pay his rent in, as well as the most equitable. The rents ought likewise to be rais ed to the full value of the lands; and strictly exacted, unless in the case of evident misfortune for in Zetland, young men, who are generally the strictest landlords. are found to be in so far the best; it is observed there, that the proprietors, as they advance in years, become personally attached to their tenantry, and over indulgent in the distribution of provisions, and in allowing their rents to run in arrear. And likewise the price given by the landlord for fish ought to be raised to the highest which any merchant can afford to give for it. All those modifications must take place before the Zetland system can be expected to produce its best effects.

The tenant in Zetland pays for his farm, from one third, to two thirds less rent than the landlord could obtain from a tacksman; while the landlord allows the tenant for the merchantable fish he catches during the summer months from 6 to

25 per cent. less than the tenant might obtain from a merchant. The prejudices of the tenants have hitherto prevented the rents from being raised, but the landlords have not been nearly so tenacious of their interests, for they have often augmented the prices which they give the tenants for fish. See pamphlet subscribed " No Zetland Laird," by Lieut. W. Scott, R. Navy.

During the last fishing season (1805,) the landlords paid on an average 5s. per cwt. for wet ling, and tusk, including the great bone; some gave nominally less than 5s. per cwt. but in general the deficiency was more than made up by the allowance of a boat and lines to the fisher, without his paying any hire for the same: it requires 2 cwt. of fish in that wet state to make one cwt. of dried fish ready for market.

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tion of their country:-That Zetland is by far over peopled: and, notwithstanding, he soon after proposes methods for making it soon double its numbers. Ditto.

That business is carried on with advantage when the capital is soon sunk, and the business wholly laid aside. Ditto, p. 46

ral printed tracts, in which they have been clearly exposed-To the report of the committee of the House of Commons on the Zetland fisheries in 1786, finding that the Zetland tenantry, and fishing, were in the best situation it could devise l'o the pamphlet by Lieut. W. Scott, R. Navy, signed, No Zetland Laird, and to the letter by the Rev. Mr Sands of That the Zetland tenantry, who at Tingwall, printed therewith-To the the out-set of life have nothing, Zetland landholder's letter to the grow every year poorer and poorer, Highland Society, and to Observa- and that the proprietors in that tions on the Zetland fishery, reprint- country have continued for many ed therewith, and to the pamphlet years, and still continue, to enrich signed "A friend to Zetland," printed themselves by robbing large sums in 1804. There is also a paper in the from such people. Ditto, page 16. Transactions of the Highland Society That it is disgraceful in the Zetland landholders to enforce the execution of the laws against foreigners violating the laws of this kingdom., Ditto, page 21.

in some respects tolerably correct; there are some remarks on the same subject in Knox's British Empire.

Besides the paper by P. N., and the two other pamphlets of which I have already spoken, I do not recol. lect that I have seen any publication which mentions the mode of managing land in Zetland in terms of decided disapprobation, except a letter from some mercantile house in Glasgow, in the Appendix to Knox's British Empire whether the reader takes any interest in the present question or not, it is highly worth his while to read that letter; it is, I firmly believe, the most compleat specimen of bare-faced selfishness that ever was committed to paper.

A concise list of some of the most palpably rare things which have been published on the subject, though it may startle the belief of readers of ordinary intelligence, may be of use to such others as, in future, may be disposed to publish philosophical remarks.

List. That population encreasing rapidly for a number of years, is no indication of prosperity. Vindicator. -That the Zetland landholders, by their mode of managing their lands, have wickedly increased the popula

-That in addition to the commonly known tenures of land, there is in Zetland the "tenure" of robbery.— That lands have often been robbed in former times, and that even in our own times, a man who died only two years ago, had a great part of his estate so robbed; and, what is more, that the robber inserts in his own rental the names of those lands, stating that he holds them by the "tenure" of Robbery or "Gripping." The Observations and Vindicator.

That when a Zetland landholder enters into trade, it is a high crime in him to make a profit on what he buys, and a profit on what he sells ; and that in the definite language of some new theories of business, this is to be denominated "Double profits.”

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fee entirely inadequate to their labours and their dangers." Dito. -That men without permanent interest in land, even without one year's lease over it, are the persons principally aggrieved by the increase of the weights, by which certain feu'duties, and permanent taxes, are paid from lands. Remarks in the Edin. Mag. 1835, by P. N.

That it is for the interest of the landlord that his tenant should be poor.

Ditto.

That it would be of advantage to a country if government was to interfere in the management of private and indisputed property. The whole in one chorus,-Observations, Vindicator, and P. N.

-That the same truths, and just principles, are every day discovered by a number of persons who have had no communication, direct or indirect with each other, is a belief which the hourly conduct of every individual testifies to be strong and universal among mankind. Though not so strong, yet almost as universal, is the disposition to conclude, that the same, or remarkably similar errors, especially if they are very extravagant, and dissonant to the plainer and shorter deductions of reason, are seldom found in different minds, without a positive communication of sentiment, more or less direct."

From what common source, the very similar, though extravagant misrepresentations which have been published of late by three or four different persons, with respect to the Zetland islands have been derived, it is most natural to enquire on the islands themselves, and that too, among the least intelligent of their inhabitants. But considering the universal extension of some tolerable degree of intelligence among all the individuals of the less complicated societies, and knowing the ge neral acuteness of the natives of those islands, even of the lowest ranks, I cannot for one moment en

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tertain the suspicion, that a set of pasitions, which never could have been put in words, without the grossest ignorance of the very rudiments of knowledge, and common affairs of the world, could ever have originated with them.

I will therefore venture to predict, that if ever those misrepresentations be traced to their real source, they will be found to have originated with some wrong-headed man, not a native of Zetland, who has most probably misspent his days in some pedantic occupation, and having been late in life removed to that country, will be strongly prejudised against the state of society into which he has been transported, exactly in proportion to his ignorance of the structure of that in which he was reared. It is well known, that in all the more populous countries, the most unskilful in the different trades and professions, are continually forced to seek a livelihood beyond the sphere of active competition : and that all countries little advanced in improvement, and, like Zetland, scantily supplied with distinct occupations, afford an asylum to several, who either through want of the abili ties which command employment, or thro' want of those humanised dispositions which gain patronage, have never been able to succeed in their native country. Thule.

October 6th, 1805.

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one of the pamphlets lately publish-
ed on the state of Shetland. This
gentleman, it appears, did not choose
to give to his writings the sanction
of his name, but assumed the title of
Vindicator. His essay, I find, has
(whether with or without reason, I
do not enquire) proved exceedingly
offensive to some of the Shetland
landholders. But I thus publicly
declare, that I am
am no "partisan of
Vindicator;" and that, so far from
being his partisan, I do not even
know the gentleman.

burgh, who, it seems, is the author of 3. The Zetland Landlord is pleased to say, that immediately on seeing the Magazine for June last (which was publised on 1st July,) he wrote a note to the Editor of the Scots Magazine," correcting various mistakes into which I had fallen, and warning me of the difficulty of the subject I had proposed to treat, viz. the state' of the common people of Shetland. He then proceeds to affect to regret that his friendly private cautions (which, he says, were not intended for the public eye,) had little good effect on me, &c. Now, all this seems very strange; for the truth is, that I never saw these kind and secret warnings † till they appeared in print

2. Although I had in the concluding paragraph of my "tour," "tour," explicitly stated that I had not enjoyed any opportunity of consulting the pamphlets lately published about Shetland, an ungracious attempt is made to show, from some trifling coincidence in expression and opinion, (which I affirm to be entirely fortuitous,) that I must, notwithstanding my previous negative statement, ei ther have perused these tracts, or that I must have implicitly adopted what was dictated to me by Vindicator or his abettors. This last supposition is out of the question. As to the former, it is not without feel. ings of indignation and disdain, that I find myself called upon to declare, a second time, that at the date on which I transmitted the concluding packet of my MS. for publication, (which was in the beginning of July last,) I had read none of the pamphlets in question;-and I must add, that hitherto I have only been able to procure a perusal of the publications on one side of the question, not on that factious side, however, to which I am alleged, by this Zetland Landlord, to be so trusty an adherent, but on the side of that landlord himself and his friends *.

*My remarks were drawn up from slight notes taken in Shetland, chiefly from conversations with the little fish

in

ing farmers (who possibly never heard of Vindicator, nor of the literary campaigns, in the south, of their own lairds.) These notes I afterwards revised (at the particular request of the former editor of the Scots Magazine,) and compared with the accounts of Shetland published in Arctic Zoology, vol. i.; in Bath papers, vol. vi.; in the Transactions of the Highland Society, vol.

.; and in Sir John Sinclair's Statistical Volumes; the only sources of information to which I had access. I know that some gentlemen, of the same pleasure-party in Shetland, did, while the vessel was lying wind-bound in Lerwick Roads, borrow and peruse various pamphlets on the state of that country; but I spent my time in traversing and had no opportunity of reading these the hills and shores around Lerwick, pamphlets, (which were left at Lerwick.) I heard, indeed, of the name Vindicator; and I heard his performance condemned. But I never learned more of him, till the inventive faculty of this Zetland Landlord dubbed me his partizan. From the specimen, however, which I myself have now received of the candour of a Zetland Landlord, I confess that I am inclined to receive with extreme caution his heavy charges against Vindicator.

4

The truth is, the Editor immediately after receiving the letter happened to learn that Mr Neill had had some

com

in the Magazine for December last, four months after the publication of the last of my remarks on Shetland.

I would be sorry, after all, to accuse this anonymous Zetlander of intentional falsehood; but I must at least affirm, that he has fallen into the grossest mistakes, and has indulged in personally injurious insinua tions with reprehensible carelessness. While he declines to undertake the responsibility which would attach to his name and character, I feel myself, in this instance, called upon to follow a different line of conduct.

I am, Sir,

Your most obedient servant, Patrick Neill.

}

Old Fish market Close, Edin. Jan. 7. 1806. P. S.-When the Zetland Landlord shall have finished his strictures, I shall take the liberty to make some observations on them in detail; remarking, in the mean time, Mr Editor, that the "supplement" to my "tour," sent in the beginning of November last (and which, in your "notes to correspondents" in last number, you mention has been delayed for want of room) would have superseded several of the Landlord's triumphant criticisms, as in that supplement I have candidly pointed out such mistakes as had come to my knowledge.

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Esq. of Banff, a younger brother of the family of Hatton, in the county of Aberdeen, and nearly related to the Earl of Fife. At eleven years of age he entered the Navy as a Midshipman, under the protection and command of his grand uncle the late Admiral Duff. Before he completed his sixteenth year he had been in thirteen engagements; and, in consequence of his gallant services, was, in 1779, made Lieutenant. He was afterwards in many actions during the American war, and was one of the Lieutenants of the Montagu of 74 guns, on the glorious 12th of April 1782.

Admiral Sir George, afterwards Lord Rodney, to whom the merits of Lieutenant Duff were known, intended to promote him; but his Lordship having been unfortunately recalled before the news of his splendid victory had reached England, and peace soon after taking place, Lieut. Duff continued to serve in the same rank, chiefly in the West Indies, till 1787, when he was obliged to return from Jamaica for the recovery of his health. He had been First Lieutenant of the Europa, of 50 guns, when Captain, now RearAdmiral Vashon, was appointed to. that ship, who found her crew in so excellent a state of discipline as gain

ed Lieut. Duff the esteem both of his Captain, and of Commodore, now Admiral Lord Gardner, who at that time commanded upon the Jamaica

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