Gazetteer of Scotland > Volume 2

HIGHLANDS.
S47
instance, * suitable inns, affording accommo-
dation superior to what could be expected,
considering their recent introduction, have been
erected or fitted up at regidar stages ; while for-
merly, even had other facilities existed, the
total want of accommodation for travellers
would of itself have presented a serious ob-
stacle to all internal intercourse.
Post-chaises and other modes of travelling,
have, during the same period, increased pro-
portionally ; and instead of five post-chaises,
which was the number kept in the town of In-
verness about the year 1803, there are now up-
wards of a dozen, besides two establishments for
the hire of gigs and riding horses, all of which
find sufficient employment. Post-chaises and
horses have also been kept up, for the last two
or three years, at all the inns on the great High-
land road, and also at Dingwall and Tain, and
at Inverary. The number of private carriages
in Inverness and its vicinity has likewise in-
creased remarkably during the last twenty-five
years, and no less than one hundred and sixty
coaches and gigs may now be seen attending
the Inverness yearly races ; whereas, at the
commencement of that period, the whole ex-
tent of the Highlands could scarcely produce
a dozen ; and at no very distant date previous-
ly, a four-wheeled carriage was an object of
wonder and veneration to the inhabitants. In
1715, the first coach or chariot seen in Inver-
ness is said to have been brought by the Earl
of Seaforth. In 1760 the first post- chaise
was brought to Inverness, and was for a con-
siderable time the only four-wheeled car-
riage in the district. There are at present
ibur manufactories of coaches in Inverness.
I may state also, that on all the principal roads
which have been constructed in the Highlands,
regular carriers, for the conveyance of goods,
now pass at all seasons of the year from In-
verness to Tain, Skye, Loch- Carron, Loch-
Alsh, Elgin, Nairn, Campbelltown, Aviemore,
&c. ; and others from Glasgow to Ballachu-
lish, &c. in the western district. Perhaps in
no instance has the beneficial influence of the
parliamentary works been more perceptible in
ite result, than in the speedy and certain con-
veyance of intelligence to the remotest quarters
of the Highlands. Through their whole extent
this department is now conducted with as much
* Tim Logman road.
regularity and despatch us in any part of the
kingdom ; and when I state that the following
extract from a letter, which I have received
from a gentleman in the Island of Skye, is
equally applicable to the other districts in
which roads have been constructed, it will be
unnecessary for me to add any thing further on
this part of the subject. " The communica-
tion of our letters and newspapers by the mail,
is very different now to what it was about
twenty years ago. Previous to the completion
of the roads, we had first only one, . and after-
wards two mails a-week ; and these were only
carried on runners' backs. There was only
one runner from Inverness to Janetown ; and
there being no piers or landing places, or in-
deed regular ferry-boats, the detention at the
ferries must have been occasionally very consi-
derable. We are now very differently situated.
We have a regular communication three times
a-week with Dingwall, with a change of horses
at different stations to the Ferry of Kyle-
haken ; and, as an instance of the facility of
communication, I receive a London Sunday
newspaper regularly here (Portree) every
Thursday morning ; a circumstance which must
appear to a stranger almost incredible, and
which of course is solely attributable to the
roads made under the authority of the Parlia-
mentary commissioners." Not less remark-
able, though more indirect, has been the im-
pulse given to agricultural improvement
throughout the Highlands. The construction
of the parliamentary roads having in the first
instance opened the means of access through
the districts generally, and also the intercourse
with the low countries, a desire was naturally
excited among the proprietors and tenantry
more or less remotely situated, to connect
themselves immediately with the general lines
of communication, and thus avail themselves
of the facilities which they afforded for im-
provements is Agriculture. Hence, numerous
lines of district road have been constructed
during the progress and since the completion
of the parliamentary works, in every part of
the Highlands, by means of statute labour;
and the rapid and important increase in the
extent of cultivation, which has uniformly been
the consequence, proves in a striking degree
the favourable effects resulting from the works
of the commissioners. Their roads being ex.
ecuted without reference to any individual in-
terest, they were made in lines most calculated