The Big Glen 



do these birds resemble the eagle ! They soar in similar 

 fashion, circling high above the hillsides, and they plane 

 rapidly against the wind. But there is one thing they 

 sometimes do which marks them at once from the eagle, 

 that is, they hover like some great kestrel above that part 

 of the hillside where they have seen a young rabbit, or 

 maybe a mouse, disappear. 



During the hour after sunset, in the months of May or 

 June, hurried, purring notes sometimes break the quiet 

 of the glen. Notes quite unlike those of any other bird; 

 but maybe the "singer " is seen seated on some old 

 post, and then he can be identified as the elusive night- 

 jar, or goatsucker as he is often called — a bird rarely 

 seen during the hours of daylight, and a summer migrant 

 only to the glen. One of the last of the summer visitors 

 to arrive, it is far on in May before his calls are heard, and 

 then one can be assured that summer is at length come. 



The wild hyacinth grows in the glen. In late May, 

 when the sun shines strongly and the last of the northerly 

 winds of spring has passed by, the glen is tinged with 

 blue, and the quiet air of an evening is laden with the 

 sweet scent of countless of these fragile flowers. Far up 

 the hillsides the hyacinths are to be found; they approach 

 even the ptarmigan country and the land of the eagle. 



The glen is noted for its grazing. During a summer 

 that is past a magnificent growth of grass stretched through 

 the strath from one end to the other. Even during the 

 opening days of September the glen was still as green as in 

 midsummer, but soon a succession of winds from the north 

 brought great cold for the season of the year, and from 

 green the grasses turned to red and brown, showing up, 

 some of them, like flaming patches against the dark hill 

 faces. 



Many deer are in the glen. During the summer davs, 

 when the sun rides high in the heavens, and when it is 

 good to live, I have seen the stags gathered in groups on 

 ^ 33 



