We have a second letter from Mr. Gerson, from Edinburgh,
complaining of our remarks on the decisions by the Crofters' Commission that affect his client, Lady Gordon Cathcart, the proprietrix of South Uist. His point is, that there was a second set of them, which not only supplement but modify those we described. In no newspaper file will there be found mention of such a complementary issue. The judgments put forth on October 12th have everywhere been treated as exhausting what was done by the Court with respect to the Cathcart property ; but Mr. Garson ought to know, and we willingly accept his testimony in advance of the detailed report by the Commissioners, which will soon appear. To what does that testimony amount ? It is admitted that as respects the 244 cases first dealt with, there was a reduction of 28 per cent, made on their rental, while 68 per cent, of arrears was extinguished. It is alleged that in 76 cases decided later, the rents were reduced only by 81 per cent. That certainly shows a considerable mitigation of the excess' to which rack-renting was carried in other cases; and though it does not greatly improve the result overhead, it helps to bring Lady Cathcart into favourable comparison with other Hebridean landowners. Nevertheless, it is a poor outcome, such as must sadly have disappointed the advisers of the pro- ceedings, for its poverty is rendered conspicuous by the fact, which Mr. Garson does not venture to contradict, that, inverting the ordinary and almost universal rule, Lady Cathcart was in every instance named as the suitor. There is a passage in Mr. Garson's letter which we do not understand. He upbraids us with representing that the reductions made affect the whole rental derived from South Hist. Surely every sane person, not to say every lawyer, mast be aware that the Commissioners could not go outside the eases brought before them.
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