In the Scottish Historical Review for October (Glasgow : Maclehose,
Jackson & Co., 4s. net) there are two noteworthy articles on the economic condition of the Highlands in the eighteenth century. Canon Roderick MacLeod summarizes the evidence of the family papers at Dunvegan, the seat of MacLeod of MacLeod, for Skye, Harris and Glenelg. Much land, was cultivated because it was difficult to import corn. The potato was introduced about the time of the last Jacobite rising ; the kelp industry began a little earlier. The population, as in Ireland, increased rapidly till 1845, when the potato famine compelled many to emigrate. Miss Margaret I. Adam discusses " Tho Eighteenth Century Highland Landlords and the Poverty Problem," and concludes that the landlords were not to blame, inasmuch as most of them had let their lands to " tacksmen " on long leases, while employment, save on the small and uneconomic holdings, was scarce. The position in Sutherland, whence the " land reformers " usually draw their more or less historic examples, was wholly exceptional. Else- where the peasantry had much more freedom.
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