“Scotland's passage from a mainly pastoral and agrarian society to a commercial and industrial one was brutal, rapid and relentless. In that transition, an entire peasant class, the cottars - perhaps as much as half of the rural population - was lost forever. They and tens of thousands of even poorer people were forced off the land across the Lowlands, Highlands and islands. They ended up in towns, cities and planned villages, they worked in mills, mines, quarries and iron works, or they emigrated to other parts of the world, or became soldiers, sailors, engineers, administrators and merchants in the service of the British Empire or the companies that thrived under its bellicose protection. Many prospered, many did not.” CommerceScotlandBritish EmpireClearancePastoralIndustrialisationAgrarianHighland ClearancesUrbanisation Book:Irish Pages, Vol. 12, No. 2: Scotland Source: Irish Pages, Vol. 12, No. 2: Scotland
“Returning to Jamaica, he had the sense of re-entering a place much less likely to alter in the coming years. Year in, year out, the cane fields produced their riches, the gangs swung their way through them, slaves were brought, seasoned, used up, replaced. Planters would go on making improvements to their great houses, to methods of production, and yes, to the conditions in which their slaves lived and worked, because it was in their interest to do so. But fundamentally the structure of life and of society did not change.” SlaveryCommerceScotlandJamaicaPlantationsThe Caribbean Book:Joseph Knight Source: Joseph Knight
