Sect. 8. supposition to be correct, the tenant must go annually before the Sheriff, with a 10. note

66

of his own in one hand, his qualifying "lease, leases, or other written titles" in the other, and, at the same time, make oath that he is clear with the world, that he has paid all rents and other burdens, rates, assessments, &c., and that the 10l. is from the land, otherwise he cannot vote; perhaps not then. How, we may ask, is this pure, free, unencumbered 10/. to be discovered?

Suppose, for example, a dwelling house is rented at 801.-how can it be ascertained that it is worth 107. more than the rent and burdens? The extra value of a farm may possibly be discovered, but the case of a house is hopeless. What is meant by yearly value?

1st. Has "value" a different signification from "return," as used in the preceding Section?

2d." Yearly." Must the farm or house be worth 107. more than the rent and burdens, &c. in that year in which the claim to vote is made, or every year, or on the average of years?

Múst the tenant annually sell 107. extra produce, though at bad markets, and actually receive and show the money in court? Borrowed 'money disqualifies him from voting.

Suppose the tenant holds a pasture farm, and the price of wool is very low, must he sell his wool?

Or, suppose a poor tenant has a small farm

on a kelp shore, which produces 307. beyond Sect. 8. the rent every third year; or a tenant has a lease of copse wood or growing timber, which being cut every seven years, returns a profit of upwards of 70%. Have none of these tenants a right to vote, because the sales of such produce happen not to be yearly?

It is hard that the frugal and poor farmer, who can pay his annual rent of 107. and thought himself thereby entitled to a vote, should be debarred his right, because he has not 207.ten pounds to satisfy his landlord, and ten pounds to satisfy his sheriff.

It is harder that that farmer should not be allowed to vote, who has his fields loaded with grain, and his pastures stocked with cattle.

Can he adduce proof, and what proof, that he is able to pocket and lay by the yearly sum of 10., after payment of his rents and other burdens, he and his family having been sustained the while, his servants' wages and other outgoings discharged? Will a yearly valuation. of the farmer's property suffice, with an affidavit that he can boast himself the owner of 101. clear profit, beyond his 10/. rent, &c.? And upon whom shall the duty of valuation in such case devolve? Upon the Sheriff? Let our lawgivers explain all this.

In some parts of this Bill the framers, in their anxiety to remedy the anomalies created by the inaccuracies of the last, have carried the

Sect. 8. demoralizing principle even beyond what was attained by the former; they have exceeded the most extravagant desires of those who cried, "The Bill, the whole Bill, and nothing but the Bill." Such is very observable in this Section, the effect of which will shortly be to break down the tenantry of Scotland to a class of fifty and sixty acre men; to reduce leases of such duration as heretofore enabled the tenant of arable farms to lay out somewhat in the improvement of his land, with the hope of an adequate return in due time, to such a term as will render that impossible, to a term of seven years; to give the landlord power to fetter his farmer with political clauses; to subject him to political tyranny; to degrade him to the condition of a vassal, and, finally, to reduce Scotland to the level of Ireland.

Here then is a power given to the Landowner to enslave agriculture to intrigue; a power not to be used merely by the ambitious, but which must be exercised even by those least desirous of political influence, in order to enable them to make head against the influx and adverse interests of the Ten-pound Voters.

Thus Ministers, in order to render their speculations more uniform, have not hesitated by this Bill to inflict a still more cruel blow on the agricultural interests; and to free their theory from anomalies and incongruities, they force the best institutions to yield or bend to

the fanciful plane of their visions. They pro- Sect. 8. es ceed, like the giant of old, to mutilate some, and rack and extend others, that they may adapt all to one iron couch.

SECTION IX.

not so

As these pages are written merely to gain Sect. 9.
information upon some points, and to examine
the right of interfering with property, it may
frankly be admitted that when the right to
confiscate private property is conceded to Par-
liament, the present Section is well adapted
to carry that purpose into execution. Many
instances might be adduced to show, that
henceforth the largest Burgh alone will return
the Member; the voice of the other Burghs,
instead of being equal, as heretofore, becoming
powerless; so that a candidate having secured
in his own interest one entire Burgh, ensures
his return for the district, even against the
wishes of the other Burghs. And it is worthy
of remark, in what a preeminent degree the
interests of certain noble families in the north
and south-west of Scotland, who are supporters
of the present administration, are promoted in
this distribution of ministerial rewards.

This Section affords a large field for discussion; it is enacted, "That every person not personally disqualified by law, shall be en"titled to be registered as herein directed, and "thereafter to vote at Elections for any of the "Towns or Districts of Towns hereinbefore " mentioned; who, when he claims to be registered, or to vote, shall have resided for six "months immediately preceding within the "Town, and shall then be in the actual personal occupaney, either as Proprietor or as Tenant, of any House, Dwelling, Warehouse or Countinghouse within the limits of the Town, which, "either separately or jointly with any land "owned or occupied therewith under the same "Landlord, shall be of the annual value of not "less than Ten Pounds."

Several observations naturally occur on reading the foregoing passage, first, as to the meaning of the words "or to vote," which are here inserted, though omitted in the last Bill, as an addition to, and an improvement upon, the former, and which evince the accurate attention which has during four months been paid even to verbal corrections,-a zeal which has sometimes carried the legislators even beyond the sense. Here the words " or to

vote

appear, as they stand in the seventh line