304 



The story of the two Highland chairmen \\ho used 

 to farm a moor has before -now been told to our 

 readers, but they were, although vastly industrious, 

 less mischievous than some other men who take 

 moors. They made a business of it, besides having a 

 feeling for the sport ; but there are many who have no 

 feeling at all, who simply desire to use their gims as a 

 means of making money, and there has arisen out of 

 this system another system of subletting giound that is 

 certainly becoming disastrous to the grouse and to 

 those proprietors that fall victims to the swindlers, 

 who, however, make a good profit out of it in one 

 way or another. There are so many gullible people 

 now-a-days that we are never surprised at anything. 

 Men ^^■ill pay a guinea a day to be allo\\-ed to capture 

 fish for some innkeeper, and think it capital sport all 

 the time, paying an extravagant hotel bill besides \^-ith 

 the greatest possible relish. There are certain smart 

 people in the north who take a moor or a range of 

 shooting and let it out to great advantage, getting 

 their own money out of it and a great deal more in 



The Country Gentleman s Magazine 



addition. We need not again go over the tricks of 

 tliis class ; they are getting known, and their greed 

 will in time work its own cui-e. What we want to teach 

 is, that, with such people at work, the birds cannot ob- 

 tain fair play; besides, from artificial and natural causes, 

 they may soon be reduced so gi-eatly below the repro- 

 ductive point as to lead in time to extermination. We 

 are overshooting our grouse in the same \\-ay that we 

 are overfishing our herring and our oysters ; the breed- 

 ing cannot keep pace with the killing, and the tempta- 

 tion to kill grouse — in the early days of the season, when 

 they are selling at 5s. each — is not easily overcome, espe- 

 cially by the kind of persons we have depicted — the 

 bird-murderers and grouse- slayers — who must make 

 money out of their sport, thus making sport what it 

 was never intended to be, a business of the most mer- 

 cenai-y kind. 



That the present will prove but a poor shooting 

 season we are warranted in believing, and, therefore, 

 in all the circumstances of the case, we feel it only 

 right to recommend the grouse to mercy. 



