The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1875-05-08

49, "'2 q -A- s1E% 1911 '~ ~+-1
cheap. For local consumption, 1t had to compete
with that same peat Of which we have been
speaking, which vas really valuable when labor
was at . discount. After much expense had
been incurred, the mine fell into the hands OF an
I~ns0lyent contractor, who fed from the country
lt was abandoned and operations for e~mptyinS
the shaft Of the accumulated rain water ol forty
years were only begun late IN 1872. The mine
Is now in working order; X l. by DO means an
extensive one, and the product + only twenty-five
tons to thirty tons a day but a. many a. fifty
tons have been raised IN a day and the supply
could be increased if the demand were greater.
1t is good serviceable fuel, and the quality Is
steadily improving, the further the mine Is
worked. Some bituminous shale has been dis
covered, and is now used al the gas-works at
Thurso. From two to three hundred tons Of coal
per month are consumed BY the Duke at his various
works throughout the county, and at DunrObin,
where il is in daily use. Tramways lead from
the mouth Of the pit to the Brora Railway Sta
ton, and to the harbor, which IL capable Of ac-
commOdating vessels OF light draught.
At Brora, has been discovered a magnificent
bank of brick-clay, and on the shore an endless
supply OF excellent fre-clay. Both these kinds
Of clay have been utilised. \ very perfect brick
work Is now IN operation. All that Is competent
to the material Is here turned out, apparently Of
the best quality and make, under the superinten-
dence of skilled workmen from England. The
shedding covers a fifth of an acre, aud can pro-
tect a hundred thousand bricks about seven
thousand a day can be turned out easily but tile
pipes, chimney-cans, roofing tiles, wall-coping,
&c, which are comparatively more IN demand
than the bricks themselves, take more time for
prediction. The fre-clay manufacture Is Of i'm
portance in the Highlands, as there is no other
work of the kind and Brora manufactured goods
have proved in analysis very nearly equal to those
of Stourbridge. So many works are IN hand, so
many new houses and cottages are in course of
erection, that it has been thought worth while to
start q steam carpentry establishment. y cargo
Of timber can be imported straight from Norway,
which is nearer Brora than London. \ few min
utes suffice to run it to the saw-mill, and the APP
planes there are so perfect that it can be turned
out in the form of doors and windOw-sashe all
complete. The building is entirely of brick, the
first Of the kind ever erected in the county it is
$50 feet long by 80 feet wide, is brilliantly lighted,
and we'll ventilated. Adjoining it is a similar
building devoted to the repairing of machinery
of all kinds, together with the store rooms, Off
ces, &c. These are not yet in working order, but
when completed, they will give employment to a
great many people, and prove of much value in
the industrial education of the Highlands. All
these works are making the little village of Brora
a place of considerable Importance. The river,
an excellent salmon stream, runs through the
centre, but the banks are high on both sides, and
very rocky. A little planting on the slopes
above would vastly improve the appearance of the
place and with it's fine sandy beach, Brora
might easily be made an attractive place of resi-
dence.
The operations described above may be said to
spring naturally one from the other; but the
works which have attracted most attention in
Sutherland, which were visited by a large num-
Der of the members of the Highland Society at
the last show at Inverness, are the operations for
retaining land in the neigbborhoOd of Lairg.
There is probably no county in Scotland in which
there is SO much uncultiyated land as in Suther-
land. Except the border, ON the sea shore, of
which we spoke above, hardly ten miles deep at
any point, and a few isolated patches of land
here and there, the whole county may be said to
be given up to black cattle, sheep, deer, which is
nearly equivalent to saying that it is in a state of
nature As this state of things is detrimental to
the climate, the reclamation of land on an extern
sive scale becomes Of first Importance.
The spot selected for the principal experiment
in bringing land into cultivation, lies beside Loeb
at Lairg. 1t is a fine Highland district, with
long low mountains and broad valleys, very little
wooded, and not at all rocky. Loeb Shin is e
noble sheet of water, twenty miles long, and cele-
brated for it's SaLnO ferOr. The day will pro-
Rf6 a4h sGI GH@H az R266g Zee i c idlgf 6G int T I9aaeES Shin hin, in hf which Tis6
case salmon fishing would be added to the at
fractions of the district. \ good road runs from
Lairg to the west coast, passing a series of lakes.
which are connected one with the other, until
they find an outlet in the sea at Laxford. The
land rises by a gentle slope from the shores of
Loeb Shin to a low ridge, then falls into a broad
udI Ndlltlg 6lIGlCulDR away " III " VI lBG
distant mountains the river Tirry flows through
it to Loeb Shin, and on every hand there are
miles and miles of apparently good soil only wait
ing to be titled. The severity Of the climate
has always hitherto been objected against recla-
nation, but after all, the level of Loeb Shin is
little more than two hundred feet above the sea.
The Duke has already planted extensively, and
has made arrangements for doing SO on a large
scale. The climate cannot be much worse than
places Immediately north and south of it, and
the result of last years work Is encouraging. On
the first farm, Collabol, excellent crops Of oats
and turnips have been gathered this autumn, as
good as can be found in the country, and the soil
was not better than the greater part of what is
now in course of reclamation. 1t is intended TO
take in about a thousand acres per annum, and
the estimated cost, including drainage, farm
buildings, roads, &C., is about twenty-five pounds
per acre. The second farm cleared is Auchan-
arTan (the field Of bread,) the old name for the
place. 1t is intended to contain SIX fields of fifty
acres each. Others in process of lanai
will consist of one of two hundred and fifty Or
three hundred acres, one of two hundred acres,
one os one hundred and twenty-five acres, with
fourteen hundred acres of pasture divided among
them. There will also be fourteen farms of forty
acres each, with six hundred acres of outrun in
common. About two hundred acres are to be
given to tenants for improvement. HIS Grace in
tends to make the farms quite complete before
letting them, taking the first crop himself, and
then letting them on an improving lease.
Twenty-Five pounds spent in retaining a sin
gle acre of land The outlay seems enormous
yet, to our knowledge, even larger sums are ex-
pended by proprietors in Scotland in retaining
waste parts Of their estate. Some years ago, a
proprietor transformed a wild peat-moss into ex-
cellent arabic land, at a cost of thirty pounds
per acre, on which outlay there has been already
a return of five per cent. per annum. besides a
considerable melioration of climate. This shews
what can be done to advantage where a spirit of
enterprise is united with capital. From what is
now so energetically going on through the outlay
of a prlncely revenue in Sutherland, the climate
of that part of Great Britain cannot fail to be
prodigiously improved. For this alone, the Duke
merits grateful acknowledgment.
4 word or two about the mode of working.
Nearly everything is done by means of steamer
lines yrbic6 ~ +raversa tho countrv IN o,r 70