Stirlings of Keir

JAMES STIRLING, THE MATHEMATICIAN. 101
their workmen. The word yards was, without doubt, originally intended to represent
no more than a small garden attached to each cottage ; but it came by degrees to re-
ceive a much more liberal interpretation, the Hopetoun family having allowed every
miner to occupy as much waste land as he could reclaim and keep in cultivation by
the labour of himself and family. To these agricultural operations, which were en-
tirely carried on by the spade, the unoccupied time of the miners was devoted. It also
happened, that the company, instead of erecting houses, permitted the men to build
them for themselves. There thus arose an ill-defined right, a sort of quasi property,
in these lands and houses, and the miners have for more than a century been allowed
to sell and transfer them to their neighbours, under the control and supervision of
Lord Hopetoun's local agents. The result of this system has been the irregular and
picturesque character of the village, where every man has built his house after his
own ideas, and the green and cultivated appearance of the environs. The latter is in-
deed the more remarkable, when we recollect that the soil around Leadhills is of the
poorest description, and that this village is situated in latitude 55° 28' N. and at an
elevation of nearly 1300 feet above the sea. In spite of these disadvantages, above
a mile square has been reclaimed from barren heath since 1731, and its annual pro-
duce has been calculated at not less that 10,000 stones of hay, and the same weight
of potatoes, independent of a small quantity of oats. These yards provide the winter
fodder for the cows of the villagers ; and to supply their summer wants, the Company
leases an adjoining farm, the rent of which is divided among the miners according to
the number of cows kept ; and the expense of this averages about 10s. 6d. a-year for
each cow. In addition to this, most of the miners purchase in the summer a sheep
or lamb, which they fatten on their yards, and kill towards the end of the year. Pigs
are seldom kept, not from any want of means to do so, but from other causes. Till
a very recent date, a Judaical prejudice against the use of bacon, as food, existed
among the peasantry of remote districts of Scotland, from which Leadhills was not
exempt. Independently of this, the soil is impregnated to a certain extent with
minute particles of lead, which have the most injurious effects on the lower animals,
and to their noxious influence, a grubbing creature like a pig is, of course, peculiarly
exposed. For the same reason poultry are unknown, while dogs and cats are less
numerous than in other places.' 1
1 A trait of the times is preserved in a note from ' George Atchison to come along "with the rest men-
James Stirling to his clerk at Leadhills, dated at ' tioned in the letter, to help Water-Meetings out
Edinburgh, 28th January 1745, in which he says — ' with two bottles of Shrub in Punch. Be sure to
' Take Thomas to my sisters and Whitfield and ' have James Eeid of the party ; and if I hear that
' Whigham and give them a bole of punch.' In a ' one of you goes home sober, I will seek another
P.S., the clerk is told 'to desire Henry Otto and ' Clerk when I come home.' (Letter at Garden.)
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