Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
where the rights of common were less valuable, but the occupants had
better opportunities for supplementing their incomes from the land by
fishing and by gathering sea-weed for kelp, from which iodine was made.
There were, however, great numbers who were not supplied with new
crofts, but turned away from their old homes and left to shift for
themselves. Some of these, too poor to go elsewhere, built rude huts
wherever they could find a convenient spot, and thus increased the ranks
of the squatters. Others were allowed to share the already too small
holdings of their more fortunate brethren, while others, again, found
their way to the lowlands and cities of the south or to America. The
traditions of the hardships and sufferings endured by some of these
evicted crofters are still kept alive in the prosperous homes of their
children and grandchildren on this side of the Atlantic. The process of
clearing off the crofters went on for many years. In 1849 Hugh Miller,
in trying to arouse public sentiment against it, declared that, "while
the law is banishing its tens for terms of seven and fourteen
years,--the penalty of deep-dyed crimes,--irresponsible and infatuated
power is banishing its thousands for no crime whatever."
Lately, owing to foreign competition and the deterioration of the land
that has been used for many years as sheep-pastures, sheep-farming has
become much less profitable than formerly, and many large tenants have
in consequence given up their farms. The enthusiasm for deer-hunting
has, however, increased with the increase of wealth and leisure among
Englishmen, and immense tracts, amounting altogether to nearly two
millions of acres, have been turned into deer-forests, yielding, as a
rule, a slightly higher rent than was paid by the crofters and
sheep-farmers. Much of this land is either unfit for agricultural
purposes or could not at present be cultivated with profit. Some of it,
however, is fertile, or well suited for grazing, and greatly coveted by
the crofters. The deer and other game often destroy or injure the crops
of the adjoining holdings, and thus add to the troubles of the occupants
and increase their indignation at the land's being used to raise sheep
and "vermin" instead of men. Most Americans have had intimations of this
feeling through the accounts of the hostility that has been shown to our
countryman, Mr. Winans, whose deer-forest is said to cover two hundred
square miles. While evictions are much less common than they were two or
three generations ago, there has all along been a disposition on the
part of the proprietors to enclose in their sheep-farms and deer-forests
lands that were formerly tilled or used as commons by the crofters and
cottars. In comparison with the crofter of to-day the sub-tenant of a
hundred years ago had, as a rule, more land for tillage, a far wider
range of pasture for his stock, and "greater freedom in regard to the
natural produce of the river and moor."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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