Scottish Court of Session Decisions

David Milne, advocate, judicial factor on the estate of Billie, presented a petition, stating that ten of the smaller tenantry on the estate, holding leases which had still four years to run, were liable for rents considerably higher than the land was now worth, or the tenants could afford; that the price of corn was one-third lower than when the leases were granted; that the tenants had applied for a reduction of rent, or freedom from their leases, and he was satisfied it would be injurious to the estate, as well as to the tenants, unless some relief could be afforded to them; that the most expedient way of relieving them seemed to be by accepting renunciations of their leases, and letting the lands anew, by public roup, as this would ascertain their present true market value. He therefore craved the Court “to grant power to the petitioner to accept renunciations of the leases from the tenants enumerated in the abstract subjoined hereto, as at the term of, and to authorizehim to relet the farms, &c. by public roup, after due notice thereof, by advertisement in the newspapers, or otherwise; or to give such abatement to the said tenants from the present rents, for the remaining years of their leases, as to your Lordships shall seem proper.”