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Changes in the Ownership of Land in Ross-shire. 293
31sT Maucii 188G.
On tins date R.iilio Chas. ^lackay, Inverness, read an intioductoiy
paper on " Stratherrick—its People and Traditions." Bailie
Mackay havini; agreed to resume the subject next session, the publication
of the fii'st part is postponed, in order that the paper may
appear in the next volume in its comj)leted form. On the same
date the Secretary, on behalf of Sir ivenneth S. Mackenzie of Cair-
loch, Bart., read a paj)er on changes in the ownership of land in
Ro.ss-shire between 1756 and 1853, Sir Kenneth's paper was as
follows :
—
CHANGES IN THE OjJrt^NERSHIP OF LAND IN
ROSS-SHIRE— 175G-1853.
The history of land-tenure in the Highlands is a subject on
whicli there seems to be very material disagreement. Mr Cham-
berlain, speaking at Inverness in September 1 885, said that until
comparatively recent times the chief held the land in trust for
his clan, and "the arbitrary claim to absolute possession and dis-
})Osition of the soil has only s})rung up within the last hundred
years." On the other hand, Novar, in a lecture which he lately
gave in Edinburgh, said that all available evidence went to show
that private property in land was very generally established
before the tribal system was l^roken up and the clans had been
called into existence ; and he indicated that a chief's power as the
head of a
necessarily
clan, and his rights as a lord of the soil, were not
co-extensive—instancing the case where Eraser of
Fraserdale's tenantry deserted him at Perth to join their chief,
Lovat, at In\eraess, and that of IMaclean of Coll who retained his
power as chief after losing his lands. Lately, wiien looking over
the rental of the Lordship of Huntly (a.d. 1600-1607), whicli is
printed in the fourth volume of the Spalding Miscellany, my
attention was attracted by an entry where Lochiel (Allane Cameroiie
M'Ouildouy) is set down as a rentaller of the Gordons
paying eighty merks for the forty-merk land of Mamore, to
which entry this curious note is ajjpended : " Memorand, Thair ar
fyve merk land moii' nor the fourtie merk land in Mamoir for the
quhilk Allane lies p;»yit notliinge, thairfoir to be tryitt."
That the possession of his land by the Chief of the Camerons
was somewhat precarious is a conclusion difficult to avoid. From
the same rental we learn that ]\Iackintosh in 1607 accepted fi-om
Huntly a set of the " the Coigs," at the head of Strathdearn, for