backbone of the peasant communities of the Western Highlands. Devine repeats the views of Marianne McLean, that those of them who emigrated were not refusing to participate in a commercial economy; rather they rejected the loss of status that the changes of improvement gave them. Phases of the Clearances The first phase of the Clearances occurred mostly over the period 1760 to 1815. However, it started before the Jacobite Rising of 1745, with its roots in the decision of the Dukes of Argyll to put tacks (or leases) of farms and townships up for auction. This began with Campbell property in Kintyre in the 1710s and spread after 1737 to all their holdings. First phase clearances involved break up of the traditional townships (), the essential element of land management in Scottish Gaeldom. These multiple tenant farms were most often managed by tacksmen. To replace this system, individual arable smallholdings or crofts were created, with shared access to common grazing. This process was often accompanied by moving the people from the interior straths and glens to the coast, where they were expected to find employment in, for example, the kelp or fishing industries. The properties they had formerly occupied were then converted into large sheep holdings. Essentially, therefore, this phase was characterised by relocation rather than outright expulsion. The second phase of clearance started in 1815–20, continuing to the 1850s. It followed the collapse or stagnation of the wartime industries and the continuing rise in population. These economic effects are illustrated by the contemporary commodity prices. Kelp had been falling since 1810; in 1823 the market price in Liverpool was £9 a ton, but it fell to £3 13s 4d a ton in 1828, 41% of the 1823 price. Wool prices also shrank over a similar period to a quarter of the price obtained in 1818, and black cattle nearly halved in price between 1810 and the 1830s. In the second phase, landlords moved to the more draconian policy of expelling people from their estates. This was increasingly associated with 'assisted emigration', in which landlords cancelled rent arrears and paid the passage of the 'redundant' families in their estates to North America and, in later years, also to Australia. The process reached a climax during the Highland Potato Famine of 1846–55. Regional differences In general terms, the transformation of the Highlands resulted in two different types of rural economy. In