From that period, down to the Revolution, the Cockburns of Ormiston were
invariably on the liberal side of the question. The subject of this memoir
inherited all the patriotism of his race, and in the lifetime of his father, in
his capacity as a member of the last Scottish parliament, took an active inter-
est in accomplishing the union. He was the first representative of East
Lothian in the parliament of Great Britain, and continued to be elected to that
distinguished place in all the successive parliaments, till 1741. Mr Cockburn,
at one period of his parliamentary career, held the post of lord of the Admiralty.
It was not, however, in a political career that this great man was destined to gather his chief laurels. At the close of the 17th century, on account of the religious and civil broils which had so long distracted the country, the condition of agriculture in Scotland was at a very low ebb. The tenantry, so far from being able to make any improvement, were too poor in general even to stock the lands they occupied. Fletcher of Salton, who published a treatise on the affairs of Scotland, in 1698, describes their situation as abject and miserable; and Lord Kaimes, in still stronger language, declares, that, before the union, they were so benumbed with oppression, that the most able tutor in husbandry would have made nothing of them. By a short-sighted policy, the landlords in general had no other principle than to force as much from the soil for every passing year as they could. The tenants were so much disheartened, that it was difficult to let a farm, and none were taken upon leases of more than five years. But, even if other circumstances had been more favourable, there was such a rooted prepossession in favour of old systems, and so much ignorance of the science of agriculture, that improvement was almost hopeless.
Lord Ormiston, father of Mr Cockburn, had made an attempt so early as 1698, to break through the old system of short leases. He then granted Robert Wight, eldest son of Alexander Wight, one of his tenants in Ormiston, a lease of the farm of Muirhouse, now Murrays, to endure for eleven years. Mr Wight accordingly commenced enclosing his fields, a process heretofore quite unknown in Scotland. In 1713, lord Ormiston granted to the same person a lease of a neighbouring farm, to endure for nine years.
John Cockburn, who became possessed of the estate about the year 1714, immediately entered upon a much more extensive system of improvement. He had marked, with extreme concern, the supine condition of Scottish husbandry, which his parliamentary visits to England had enabled him to contrast with the more fortunate condition of that country; and with an enlarged liberality of soul, which scorned all his own immediate interests for the sake of ultimate general good, he began to grant long leases of his farms upon exceedingly small rents. As an instance it may be mentioned, that he granted to Robert Wight a new lease of the Murrays farm for thirty-eight years, from 1718, at a rent of £750 Scots, or £62 : 10 : sterling, and upon paying £1200 Scots, on £100 sterling, by way of fine or grassum, at the expiration of that term, a renewal thereof for other nineteen years, and so on from one period of nineteen years to another in all time coming: a degree of liberality which speaks more strongly than any thing else possibly could, for the backward state of agriculture at the time. But the enterprising spirit of Mr Cockburn did not rest here. In giving long leases he had enabled his tenants to make the improvements he wished; but still it was necessary to teach them how these improvements should be conducted. For this purpose he brought down skilful persons from England, who introduced the culture of turnips, rape, and clover; and at the same time he sent up the sons of his tenants to study agriculture in the best cultivated districts of the south. Experiments were likewise made of the effects of enriching the land by flooding. Turnips were sown upon the es-
