Series 1 > Diary of the Reverend John Mill, minister of the parishes of Dunrossness Sandwick and Cunningsburgh in Shetland, 1740-1803. With selections from local records and original documents relating to the district

152
APPENDIX
[1756
consider encroachments, Mill brought in the following honest
men as evidence of the Bounds of Skelberry etc., to wit,
George Burgess, James Leslie and Gilbert Irvine, tenants in
Clumley, Andrew Harper, Andrew Charleson and John
Shewan, tenants in Skelberry, Alexander Cheyne, tenant in
Lunabister, John Shewan in Troswick, and Robert Marshall
in Dalster, who being proposed to the said John Morrison,
[acting for John Bruce Stewart of Bigton] and he declaring
he had no objections against any of them, were solemnly
sworn. Thereafter Robert Scott of Scotshall, an heritor of said
parish, having come up to the Presbytery, went along with
them, together with John Morrison and the witnesses, to inspect
the Boundaries foresaid, which being done and the Witnesses
severally called into the Presbytery, they deponed as follows :—
George Burgess, aged seventy-six years, married, purged
of malice and partial counsel, solemnly sworn and interrogate
depones as follows: Pr'wio. As to the Boundaries of Skelberry
within the old Dykes. That said Dykes run from the mouth
of the Burn called Hogard to the Sandy Slap1 northward,
and from thence north east, and from thence north west
across the Burn to the house of Durigarth, and then north
east to the Burn again, including all the land lying betwixt
said Dyke and said Burn called old Durigarth. Being
asked, whether or not he ever heard or knew of anybody
that ever laboured said ground betwixt said Dyke and Burn
besides the people of Skelberry? answered negatively. Depones
also that the said old Dykes run from the Burn at the Water
Slap eastward, including Reswick and Collapund, to the ruins
of an old house sometime possessed by Charles Williamson,
and from thence to the southward including that piece of
ground commonly called the North Meadow, where it joins
the east Burn, and runs down said Burn to the place called
the hole of Clowell where it crosses said Burn eastward,
and incloses that piece of ground called Voesgarth, and from
thence westward inclosing the south meadow and new pund
until it join the Dyke at the mouth of the Burn Hogard
mentioned above at the north side of the Loch. Secundo.
1 Slap : a breach in a dyke to admit of persons passing through.