SUTHERLAND, an extensive county in the north of Scotland, situated between 57° 53' and 58° 36' north latitude, and between 3° 39' and 5° 15' west longitude from Greenwich; having the sea on the south-east, west, and north, Caithness on the north-east, and Ross-shire on the south. From north to south it extends from 35 to 50 miles, and from west to east from 45 to 50, and contains, according to the latest authorities, 1754 square miles, or 1,112,560 English acres divided into thirteen parishes, which belong to the synod of Sutherland and Caithness. Of the other divisions, the principal are, Assynt and Edderachylis on the west, and Strathnaver on the east; names recognised by the inhabitants, and which still serve to designate the locality of the natural objects and other circumstances of the country.

The coast of Sutherland, like that of the other Highland counties of Scotland, presents a succession of inlets of the sea, and bold promontories, with a number of rocks and islets. The principal arms of the sea are Lochs Assynt, Laxford, and Inchard, on the west; Durness Bay, Loch Eriboll, the Kyle of Tongue, and the bays of Torrisdale and Strathy, on the north; and Loch Fleet in the Frith of Dornoch, on the south-east: and the more remarkable promontories are, Ru Stoir, on the south side of Loch Assynt; Cape Wrath, on the north-west extremity of the county; Far-out Head and Whitten Head, on the north; and Strathy Head, on the north-east. The interior consists of mountains, mosses, lakes, and streams, presenting great variety in form, but almost all having the same general character of being barren, rugged, and dismal, more especially on the western side; and so closely thrown together, that there is no valley of any extent, and seldom a tree or a shrub, to relieve the eye. The Assynt mountains have not even heath to cover their nakedness, except in patches among the rocks near their base. Exceptions to this general character occur on the eastern coast, along the Dornoch Frith, and on the banks of a few of the lakes and rivulets. From its latitude, and exposure to the winds of the German and Northern Ocean, the climate of Sutherland is sharp and cold. On the east coast, however, it is not so severe as to prevent the growth of wheat, which sometimes ripens as early here as in many parts of England.

The principal streams are, Oickel, Fleet, Brora, and Helmsdale, which fall into the Dornoch Frith on the southeast. The tide renders the Oickel navigable by vessels of fifty tons for about twelve miles, and for boats for about eight miles farther; and they have all good salmon fisheries. These rivulets have their sources among the mountains in the centre of the district, and flow south-east-In the same quarter various streams take their rise, and flow in a northerly direction; such as Strathy, the Naver, which gives its name to the tract called Strathnaver, the Dinart, &c., most of them containing salmon. The most considerable lake is Loch Shin, about twenty miles long and one broad, situated on the southern side of the county, through which flows a stream of the same name, which falls into the Oickel. There are several others of considerable extent in different parts, the whole occupying about fifty-three square miles, or nearly 34,000 acres. On the north coast the sea has formed some remarkable caves in the limestone rock, particularly one at Smow, to the east of Balnakeel of Durness, thirty-two yards wide and twenty yards high; and another at Fraisgill, fifty feet high, and twenty feet wide at its entrance, but contracting by degress till its termination, more than half a mile under ground.

The oldest formation of rocks in Sutherland is gneiss, which extends over the whole county, and affords a great diversity of aspect in the stratification. This formation is traversed by granite veins, which abound in various places in the south-east part of the county, as also in the upper part of the parishes of Reay and Edderachylis. The gneiss is also traversed by veins of greenstone and porphyry. Those of the greenstone are found in great abundance in the south-east district of Assynt, and in the country around Scourie in Edderachylis parish. Porphyry veins are of rare occurrence. Mica-slate is developed to a considerable extent in two parts of the county; in that portion of the district of Moin which stretches southwards, and constitutes the whole of the mountains of Ben-Hope, Ben-Hee, and Meal-Rynies; and that part of the county between Loch Fleet and Bonar Bridge. Granite fields prevail in the lower part of the parish of Reay, and in the parishes of Loth and Kogart. Syenite is to be met with in several places. It is most abundant in the mountain of Ben-Laoghal, and that considerable tract of hilly country which intervenes between the head of Loch Fleet and Lairg, at the foot of Loch Shin. The quartz series of rocks occurs principally in greater or less fields in the west part of the county, from Loch Eriboll on the north, to Loch Vattie on the south. This series is connected with sandstone and limestone. The latter is divided into four great fields connected with each other, and running in the same direction as the quartz. There is also a portion of nearly six miles in length at Durness, between Loch Eriboll and Cape Wrath. Red stone and conglomerate are extensively displayed on the east side, and at several points on the north coast and the interior. The oolite series of rocks, consisting of white sandstone, sandstone flag, slate-clay, limestone, and coal, forms the coast between Golspie and the Ord of Caithness, and has a breadth at the river Brora of three miles. At Brora, coal occurs at several points, but it has been found not to be worth the working. Calcareous sinter and bog iron ore are the only chemical alluvial deposits to be found in the county.

This county, which is valued in the cess-books at L.26,193. 9s. 7d. Scots, is almost entirely the property of the duke of Sutherland. In 1812 the gross rental of the lands and houses, as returned under the property-tax act, was L.28,458. 8s. 4d. including about L.1700 as the rent of the salmon and other fisheries. Since that period, the great and extensive improvements effected by the spirited proprietors must have augmented the rental in a corresponding degree. More than half the valuation is held under entail. The principal seats are, Dunrobin Castle, duke of Sutherland, on the coast of the Dornoch Frith, in the parish of Golspie; Skibo, Dempster, on an inlet of the same frith, near the south-eastern corner of the county; and Tongue Castle, on the Kyle of Tongue, on the north coast. Most of the other proprietors have good modern houses, all of which are situated near the coast. In no part of Britain has a greater change been effected in so short at period as in Sutherland, and this chiefly by the spirit and liberality of its greatest proprietor, the duke of Sutherland. Within these twenty or thirty years, roads, bridges, harbours, and villages, have been constructed wherever they seemed to be required; and both the natural and moral obstructions to the improvement of this extensive territory have, as far as it appears practicable, been in a great measure overcome. Before the beginning of the present century, Sutherland was almost in a state of nature, excluded from the benefits of that civilization which had spread over[7:21:11] the rest of Britain; and this exclusion was principally owing to the want of roads and other means of communication.

During the last twenty years the greatest changes have taken place. “Before that period, the injurious system of sub-letting prevailed, and both the knowledge and the practice of farming were exceedingly defective. The place of Dunrobin excepted, there was neither draining, trenching, nor fallow, and very little green crop, besides potatoes and a little pease. There were few fences, and these few bad. The plough, which was rudely constructed, had no part of it iron but the coulter, the sock, and the hook at the end of the beam. Four country garrans, or highland ponies, were yoked to the plough abreast, and the driver walked in front of them backwards. There were few wheeled vehicles that deserved the name. Corn, fuel, &c. were carried in a kind of frame called crubags, fastened on horseback to a wooden saddle, that rested on a straw-mat. The public road was the only one, and that itself indifferent. The dwellings of the subtenants were wooden frames, thatched with turf; and of these, one end accommodated cattle, horses, and. sometimes pigs. One end also of the turf-coverings of these huts, saturated as it was with soot, was annually stript off and converted into manure. With such dwellings the dress of their tenants corresponded. The state of things is now very different. Farming is brought to the highest degree of excellence that industry, skill, and expense, can bring it. Nor is it too much to say, that the system of farming at present followed in the county does not fall short of the best modes of farming in any part of the kingdom. The farmers have very good houses, with two public rooms; and they have their wheeled carriages for personal and family use. Sub-letting is abolished. The small tenants or cottars live in decent cottages, built with stone and lime, or clay, with glass windows; and their fare is correspondingly better; and the tradesmen and ploughmen wear good clothes. In no county of Scotland was there ever, in so short a time, the same length of road made, as there has been within the last twenty years in the county of Sutherland, In former times the internal communication was by mere paths or tracks, and many parts of it were all but inaccessible. Now, several hundred miles of good road, unchecked by tolls, intersect the county in every direction; and there is free and easy access to every part of it. These roads were made, partly by the parliamentary commissioners and the county, but chiefly at the expense of the noble proprietors, and under the able management of James Loch, Esq. M. P. their commissioner.”^[1. Statistical Account of Scotland. ]

Sutherland is eminently adapted by nature for sheepgrazing; and the plans of converting it into extensive sheep-walks, which have been for some years carrying into execution, have greatly augmented the revenue of the proprietors, and added to the commercial wealth of the nation; but they have doubtless been attended with much suffering to the small tenants whom it was necessary to dispossess. The people who had been removed from the interior in 1818 and 1819, when these great changes took place, are densely settled along the sea-coast; in some instances about thirty cottagers occupying the land formerly in the possession of twelve. They have likewise been obliged to make a' violent change in their occupations and habits: instead of tending flocks, and following other rural occupations, they have been forced to encounter the hardships and dangers of the sea, and occupy themselves with the fisheries; and many families have preferred emigration from their native country, to engaging in occupations so entirely foreign to their previous habits.

The ordinary system of husbandry adopted is the five-course shift rotation of crops; and trenching and draining have been executed to a great extent. The rent of arable land is from 20s. to 30s. per acre. The corn-farms are generally of such an extent as yield from L.50 to L.200 of annual rent; few exceed L.300. The average rate of grazing is L.1. 10s. per ox or cow grazed, and 2s. per sheep. The leases of farms are generally for nineteen years; but the cottagers on the coast are almost always tenants at will, which is evidently a bar to the improvement of their cots. But the greater part of the county is laid out in extensive sheep-farms, yielding about L.500 of yearly rent each. The Cheviot or white-faced breed of sheep is that which is generally kept. The Dunrobin breed of cattle, originally from Argyleshire, is excellent. Some Ayrshire cows are kept for dairy use. On some farms the breed of Galloway black-polled cattle, and highland black cattle, are chiefly reared. Goats were once a part of the stock of the farmers, but they have now nearly disappeared.

Until the recent establishments of the duke of Sutherland, there was no manufacture in this county, if we except that of kelp, of which the quantity used to be 250 tons. A cotton-mill had been erected at Spinningdale, on a branch of the Dornoch Frith, by a Glasgow company; but the building having been burnt down in 1806, the undertaking was abandoned. A good many boats are employed in the fisheries on the west and north coast for cod, ling, haddock, and herring; and lobsters and mussels are found in considerable quantities. At Helmsdale, on the east coast, many of those small tenants who were removed by the introduction of sheep-farming, have also embarked in the fisheries with considerable success; and large sums have been expended within these few years by the noble proprietor of the Sutherland estate in erecting the necessary buildings. The principal exports are sheep, wool, cattle, horses, salmon, and cod. Their butter and cheese are nearly all consumed at home; and besides the usual imports of cloths, groceries, &c., they require some corn, chiefly oatmeal, especially on the west and north sides of the county, where they have very little corn-land.

Dornoch, a royal borough, situated on the south-eastern extremity, on the frith of that name, is the only town, and contains little more than 500 inhabitants. Golspie, Helmsdale, and Brora, are the principal villages. With these exceptions, the inhabitants are scattered along the coast, and in some of the principal straths, passing much of their time in idleness; a healthy, robust, and simple, though not ill-informed race, who have contributed largely to the public service. For the last half century, the Sutherland family have raised among them, at the commencement of every war, a corps of a thousand men, well known by the name of the Sutherland Fencibles; but this military spirit, founded in attachment to their chiefs, has now become much weaker than formerly.

The schools in the county are the parish schools, and those of the Society for propagating Christian Knowledge and the Gaelic School Society. According to the last parliamentary returns, there was neither printer nor bookseller in the whole county; a circumstance indicating either great poverty or little literary taste among the inhabitants. Sutherland is distinguished from every other county in the kingdom in being undisturbed by religious dissent; there is not a single dissenting place of worship within its limits. Savings banks have been established in some of the parishes. The only prison in the county is at Dornoch. The number of prisoners during the year 1833 was twenty, of whom six were committed for smuggling, and ten for assaults.

In various districts along the coast, there are some remains of antiquity. The most interesting are two circular buildings, called Dun Domadil, or Dornadilla’s Tower, and[7:21:12] Castle Coll, both reared of large stones, nicely fitted, but without cement, and of which considerable portions are still entire, after the lapse of probably 1000 years. Castle Coll, which is situated on the east side of the county, on a stream that falls into the Brora, has an exterior circumference of fifty-four yards, with walls four yards and a half thick at the base, inclining inwards nine inches in every three feet in height; and two small apartments on each side of the door-way, as if intended for guard-rooms. The highest part of the wall is now only eleven feet high, but old people remember it twice that height. Dun Dornadil is in the parish of Durness, on the northern side of the county. It is a building of the same character with the former, but still more dilapidated, and is celebrated in the ancient Gaelic ballads as a place of renown at a very early period. The ruins of Dornoch cathedral still display the original grandeur of that edifice, which is said to have been built in the eleventh century, and repaired and enlarged in the thirteenth. Circular cairns with subterraneous passages, tumuli, and some small forts, may yet be traced in various situations along the coast.

The county sends one member to parliament; and the town of Dornoch joins with Cromarty, Dingwall, Tain, Wick, and Kirkwall, in electing one for the Scotish burghs.

The population, according to the census of 1801, was 23,117, in 1811 it amounted to 23,629, in 1821 to 23,840, and in 1831 to 25,518, of which 12,090 were males, and 13,428 were females. The families employed in agriculture were 3567, in trade and manufactures 409, in all other occupations 1029.

New Statistical Account of Scotland; Henderson’s General View of the County of Sutherland; Loch’s Account of the Improvements of the Marquis of Stafford in Sutherland; and Cunningham’s Essay on the Geology of the County, in Quarterly Journal of Agriculture, No. xlvi.