last dreary period, that the largest accession has been made both to the numbers of the people and to the number of the poor; and although other causes have contributed towards the result, the coincidence may be fairly claimed as an illustration of the tendency of poverty to increase the redundancy of population. 246 CHAPTER VI. CAUSES OF OVER-POPULATION IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND. Relations subsisting between Highland Chieftains and their Clansmen in former Times. - Decline of the clannish Feeling after the Rebellion of 1745.-Ejection of Highland Tenantry and Formation of Sheep Farms. Decay of Kelp Manufac ture. Effects of Misery on the Character and Habits of the Poor. Usual Explanation of the excessive Populousness of Ireland its Incompleteness. Primeval Poverty of the Irish Peasantry. - Pastoral Occupation of the primitive Irish, and of their Descendants, until the latter Part of the 18th Century. Wretched State of the labouring Class down to the same Epoch. Slight Improvement of their Condition, in consequence of the Extension of Tillage. Effect of this Improvement on Population. Contrast between Ulster and the rest of Ireland. — Tenant Right. — Proneness of the Irish Poor to early Marriage. - - IN tracing the over-population of Scotland to its source, it will not be necessary to review the earlier portions of the social history of that country. A reference to the events of recent years will suffice. In the Lowlands the condition of the peasantry is not only comfortable at present, but is said to have improved very perceptibly within the last half century; and in the Highlands, where the signs of over-population are too prominent to be overlooked, they have become conspicuous only within a still shorter period. As long as the Highland chieftains retained and valued their patriarchal influence, and preferred the charms of solitary sway to the pleasures of intercourse with equals, their incomes were spent entirely amongst their respective clans, and were devoted chiefly to the maintenance of the largest possible body of retainers. Such of their lands as were not managed by their own servants, were parcelled out among tenants, from whom the most valuable returns expected were fidelity and obedience. Most of the farmers, however, were freeholders, who paid no rent whatever, and were only liable to a contribution called calpe, in token of their personal subordination to the chief. Single men without property were maintained by the chief, or by some of their richer clansmen, whom they served in peace, and followed in war; but no one ever thought of marrying until, by inheriting a farm or procuring the lease of one, he had got a house of his own over his head. While these usages prevailed, population could not increase beyond the means of subsistence, and the poorest Highlanders, secure from actual want, and inured to hardships, lived happily and contentedly. After the rebellion of 1745, however, the Highlanders were disarmed; the use of their distinctive garb was forbidden; the hereditary jurisdictions of their leaders were abolished, and by means of military roads and English garrisons, the authority of the general government was extended over every part of their wild country. Many of their chiefs fled, and those who remained soon became as undesirous as they were unable to resume their former social position. There was no longer any motive to maintain a crowd of dependents, who could offer no effectual opposition to the law; and the only advantage which a laird derived from the populousness of his estate, consisted in the ability to raise troops for the Crown, and so to obtain commissions for himself and his relatives. It was part of the wise policy of the great Lord Chatham, to allay the disaffection of the Highlanders, by raising regiments of them for his Canadian expedition; and it is said that, at one time, a fifth part of the men able to bear arms were in the army. When this resource failed, the Highland lairds, who had now imbibed a strong taste for the enjoyments of civilised life, had to seek other modes of improving their incomes, and for this purpose very extraordinary facilities had of late been afforded to them. By a series of changes the Highland tacksman, who was originally co-proprietor of his land, had become at first vassal, then hereditary tenant, and lastly tenant-at-will of the chief, and the latter had been declared by law absolute proprietor of the land occupied by his clan. The chiefs did not hesitate to avail themselves to the utmost of the advantages thus conceded to them, and, with the view of raising their rents, began to oust the tenants of the small grazing farms into which the Highland counties had been divided, in order to form extensive sheep-walks. To such an extent has this been done, that in many places where once were numerous black cattle farms, now not an inhabitant is to be seen for miles. This was a revolution very similar to the one which took place in England towards the close of the 15th century, and would have been followed immediately by the same melancholy conse quences, but for certain circumstances which served for a time to furnish the dispossessed peasantry with new means of employment and subsistence. The construction of the Caledonian and Crinan Canals, of roads and bridges, and other public works, provided occupation for considerable numbers, and the pecuniary allowances made to volunteers during the last war, were also a very important assistance. But the most valuable resource was the manufacture of kelp, which attained to an astonishing degree of prosperity during the war, and drew off to the western coasts and islands the bulk of those inhabitants of the inland districts, who possessed no adequate means of livelihood at home. After the repeal of the duty on salt in 1822, however, the kelp manufacture rapidly declined, and it is now almost wholly extinct, and its decay has deprived multitudes of their principal means of subsistence.* Meantime the consolidation of farms is still going on as actively as ever. It is only within the last five and thirty years that the straths and glens of Sutherland have been cleared of their inhabitants, and that the whole county has been converted into one immense sheepwalk, over which the traveller may proceed for forty miles together without seeing a tree or a stone wall, or anything but a heath dotted with sheep and lambs.† Even the few cot * Skene's Highlanders of Scotland, vol. i. ch. 6. and 7. Evidence taken by Highland Emigration Committee. port of Scottish Poor Law Commissioners. † Reports of "Commissioner" of Times Newspaper, June, 1845. |