162 Mr. Macgillivray's Account of the Outer Hebrides. 



places where it can see around it to a great distance. Its smell is 

 such that one needs not expect to steal upon it, unless he moves 

 against the wind ; and its acuteness of vision renders approach 

 very difficult, the deer being much more likely to perceive its ene- 

 my than the latter to perceive it, more especially as its colour so 

 nearly resembles that of the brown herbage of the heaths. The 

 Avant of trees and brushwood is an additional circumstance which 

 impedes the hunter in his progress. Yet under all these unfa- 

 vourable circumstances, and many others to boot, an expert hunter 

 may approach within pistol-shot ; and I have myself, without much 

 practice, been within three yards of a deer. When deer are shot 

 at they scamper off in great trepidation, but after proceeding about 

 200 yards, turn and stand for a moment, and then set off with re- 

 newed speed, when they betake themselves to the distant heights. 

 The male alone, as every body knows, carries horns. The number 

 of branches on each horn, has been found, in the Outer Hebrides, 

 amounting to eleven or twelve. Eight, however, are considered as 

 the highest number^ excepting in extraordinary cases. The back 

 and sides are reddish-brown, the belly and perinaeum dull white, 

 the feet gray. The female is much inferior to the male in size. 

 Both have a prominence on the forehead. The rutting season is 

 from Michaelmas to Martinmas, when the stags bellow, roll them- 

 selves in mud and pools, fight with their fellows, and by their long 

 journies and violent exertions become very thin. The deer were 

 so plentiful in Harris and Lewis thirty years ago, that the poor 

 people found it difficult to keep them off their little patches of 

 corn, which they came to eat under night, and the lairds were so 

 selfish as to prohibit the use of guns. The late Lord Seaforth, 

 however, being translated to another sphere, and local militia be- 

 ing instituted, they very rapidly decreased. The hunters of the 

 Hebrides are not good marksmen, and never shoot running or flying, 

 nor do they ever venture to fire at a deer unless with a rest. They 

 seldom employ ball in shooting deer, preferring buck-shot or swan- 

 shot. I have heard of a shepherd in Lewis killing five with one 

 shot, and an individual was named to me who had shot eighteen in 

 one season. The stags are in best condition immediately before the 

 rutting season, and the females about Martinmas. The stag is 

 vernacularly named damh, the doe adh or grighach, the young 

 laogk ; and the species is designated by the name oijiadh. The 

 antlers of the red deer were the badge of the clan Kenneth, or 

 Blackenzies. This species is the sole representative of the Rttmi- 

 nantia in the Outer Hebrides. 



2. The Pine Martin, — Mustela Martes, Linn. ; in the Gaelic 

 language Taghan, is not very uncommon in some parts. It resides 

 in holes among the blocks and loose stones on the sides of the moun- 

 tains, and lives upon feathered game and other birds. It is also 

 said occasionally to attack very young lambs. 



3. The Common Shrew, — Sorex araneus, — in Gaelic An Lttch 

 fheoir, (the grass mouse,) occurs in the sandy pastures, especially on 



banks near rivulets. 



