inclined to believe, from the turn that the young people have taken to manufactures, that farmers have rather found it difficult to procure fervants and labourers for the purposes of cultivating the land: Perhaps it will be the intereft both of the landlords and the farmers, to fall upon fome mode of management which may counteract this growing evil.

NUMBER

NUMBER XX.

UNITED PARISHES OF STRONSAY AND EDAY.

(PRESBYTERY OF NORTH ISLES, SYNOD OF ORKNEY, COUN TY OF ORKNEY AND SHETLAND.)

By the Rev. Mr JOHN ANDERSON, Minister.

Extent and Situation..

THE LAD

HE Island of Stronfay is five computed miles long, and almost as broad from East to West, so indented with bays, that there is no part of the island above one mile from the fea. This, with the fall ifland of Papa, the extent of which, round the fhores, is about three miles; and with the Holms, br pasture islands, comprehends what is now termed the parish of Stronfay. The island of Eday, which is about the centre of the North ifles of Orkney, has rapid tides, which wash the East and Weft fides of it; thefe occafion eddies on the North and South ends, to which circumftance, it pro3 D 2 bably

bably owes its name. It is computed to be five miles long, and nearly a mile and a half broad +

Sea Coaf, Harbours, &c-The ifland of Stronfay has fix principal nefles; viz. Huipsnefs, Gricenefs, Odness, Lamnefs, Tornefs, and Linksnefs. The refemblance in found which two of thefe, Tornefs and Odnefs, have to Thor and Woden, the Teutonic Deities, leaves room to conjecture their derivation.

There are two promontories, Borrowhead on the South Eaft, and Rothesholm (Ronfum) head on the South Weft; this was of old called Rodneip or Rodnumhead.

The other parts of fea coast or fhores about this island, confift partly of three fandy bays; one on the Eaft, the Milnbay; one on the South, the bay of Holland; and one on Weft, the bay of Erigarth or West Wick. The fandy beaches of the two first mentioned, extend each a mile in length; that of the last not fo much, except at low water of spring tides; and confift partly of fkerries, (flat rocks, over which the fea flows and ebbs ;) which, with the fhores of the neffes,

and

This, with the Ifle of Fairay, which is about one mile long, and less than half a mile broad, and with the Holmes, comprehends the parish of Eday, To the parish of Stronfay, the four holms called Auskerry, Mukle Linga or Holm of Midgarth, Little Linga and Holm of Huip, do belong; and to the parish of Eday five; viz, Calf of Eday, Mukle Green Holm, Little Green Holm, Holm of Fairay and Red-holm. So the number of islands, great, and fmall, in this diftrict, amounts to no less than thirteen. This district has the island of Sanday on the North, the Fair lile on the North Eaft; (at the manfe, ficuated on the N. E. fide of Stronsay, this ifle may be distinctly feen, when the sky is clear and wind easterly, although about thirty fix miles diftant;) the German Ocean on the Eaft, the united parishes of Deerness and St. Andrews on the South; the parish of Shapinskay on the South Weft; the united parishes of Renfay and Eglifhay on the Weft; and the united parishes of Weftray and Papa Weftray, on the North West.

and South Weft promontory above mentioned, produces great quantities of tang, or fea-weed, fit for the kelp manufacture.

On the Eaft fide of the island, little kelp can be made, as few fkerries ly there to produce tang. The water is deep nigh the shore, and the rocks abrupt, owing perhaps to their having no fhelter from the German Ocean.

The ridge or rifing ground, which runs almoft the length of the island from North to South, hath its furface covered with fhort heath, where it has not been cut up lately for turf or feuel; the foil is a dry, friable, blackifh earth; the bottom clay, mixed with fmall ftones, and in many places gravelly and shallow. The expence of cultivating fuch a fubject, might perhaps nearly equal its value when improved. It is the common pafture or out-freedom of all the farms and houfes adjacent to it. The Mill-dam divides this from the common pafture of the farms on the Eaft fide of the island, which common is covered with grafs of a mean quality; but as it has greater deepness of foil than the other common, and a bottom of tough clay, it might probably recompence more liberally the labour and expence of the improver .

The

Of old, the corn fields, and fuch grafs as was esteemed valuable, on this island, were feparated from the commons, now defcribed, by hill-dykes, (as they are ufually termed,) built of feal or turf, which are kept up through Orkney in general to this day. A confiderable proportion of the hill-dykes of this island were fuffered to fall into difrepair, about thirty years ago, by the advice of Thomas Balfour, of Huip, an heritor in this ifland, who died about feven years ago. He was of opinion, that the expence of keeping up these dykes, was greater than the advantage derived from them; but this opinion is not universally acquiefced in by the inhabitants.

All the noffes above mentioned, except Linkfnefs, (of which under the article flate of agriculture, &c.) are appropriated for fheep paflure, on the ref peЯive ifthnuffes of which neffes, hill-dykes are still kept in repair, to prevent

the

The fmall island of Papa Stronfay, lying flat with corn fields, which have been ftimulated by plenty of ware, to raise luxuriant crops of grain, lyes on the North East side of Stronfay, is feparated from it by a narrow found, over which two men can row a small boat in five minutes, and adds a varigated beauty to the profpect on that fide.

The island of Eday, confifting chiefly of hills of a moderate height, and pretty extensive, had been much used of old for pafture, as appears from ancient rentals, (1598 and preceeding,) in which, a great proportion of its rent is charged in butter and flesh. Three fourths of it, at least, consist of out-freedom, or common pasture, to this day; this common is covered mostly with heather, which, in fome places, though not in general, is pretty long, and is divided from the grafs and corn fields, by hill-dykes, as in the days of yore. On this common, a confiderable number of fheep, befides horses,

black

the fheep from ftraying over the island in fummer and harveft; (the neís fheep have no herds;) but, during the winter, and more than half the spring, they have full freedom to graze at large over the island. Borrowhead, and Rothesholm are alfo fheep walks; the latter of which, being of great extent, comprehends the whole peat mofs in the island of Stronfay, from which most the inhabitants have, for time immemorial, been in use to caft peats or turf for firing, on paying a small acknowledgement in money or fervices, to the tenant or poffeffor of the farm of Rothesholm.

The commons, and sheep pasture above described, are reckoned to be nearly two thirds of the whole ifland. The other third forms the skirts or borders of it; where Nature's fimple variety hath hitherto been but little encroached on by the regular uniformity of art. Corn fields, of different shapes and fizes, which fields, no man living ever saw in pasture, interspersed with a proportional extent of grafs of different qualities, grafs which bears no traces of having ever been in tillage; these exhibit a fcene not unpleasant, in the months of fummer and harvest.

The fields too, of natural grafs, even in winter, retain a degree of lively verdure, fuperior to those in many of the interior parts of Scotland. It is ob fervable, that the flatter any of those islands are found to be, the better, ufually, is the quality of their grafs, and the more lively their verdure.