"A detailed and surprisingly gripping account of improvement in action. Bonnyman's careful analysis of the Buccleuch archive provides a convincing account of the aristocratic contribution to Scotland's agricultural improvement, and it will prove an invaluable tool for anyone interested in the subject." -- Alexander Dick, Eighteenth-Century Scotland "This volume paints a complex picture with an admirably light touch; it deserves its place in a prestigious publishing series and makes a key addition to a wide range of historical and intellectual fields." -- Annie Tindley, Agricultural History Review "Bonnyman's book shows us how to weave together intellectual, economic and political history in new exciting ways. This is a superb book that deserves to be widely read." -- Fredrik Albritton Jonsson, Journal of Scottish Historical Studies "Early on in this interesting and multi-faceted tale, the author reminds economic historians that improvement was not just about productivity as revealed by our crunching of numbers but also through changing moral, philosophic, and aesthetic values. Brian Bonnyman has fashioned an interesting and equally balanced approach to the life and times of a complex man in his complex time." -- Michael Turner, Economic History Review "[This volume] highlights Smith's role as both tutor and adviser to the duke and shows that Smith's ideas had an important infl uence on his pupil's attempts to improve his estates.

The book can be read as a case study of the ways in which the intellectual concerns of the Scottish Enlightenment and its associated culture of improvement infl uenced the management of a nobleman's landed estate." -- Hiroyuki Furuya, Journal of the History of Economic Thought "An intriguing view into the estate management and improvement policies of the third duke of Buccleuch, an often-overlooked figure within the eighteenth-century Scottish Enlightenment." -- Daniel Bochman, University of Edinburgh, Northern Scotland.