HISTORY OF THE SPECIES IN SCOTLAND. 29 



proof, I sliould be inclined to consider this an escaped bird 

 from some one of the localities where the earlier attempts at 

 reintroduction were made, as recorded by Fleming {'Brit. 

 Animals' 1828). Mr. Charles Buxton, editor of the 'Memoirs 

 of Sir Thomas Foiuell Buxton, Bart.,' writing in 1852 (fifth 

 edition, p. 332), states that the last bird " was shot about a 

 hundred years ago in Perthshire," but this is probably an 

 error (though possibly enough he may have had a record of a 

 bird killed in Perthshire at that time^), and the record reaUy 

 most likely applies to the birds last seen in Strathspey or 

 Strathglass. 



There is no other evidence of a satisfactory nature that I 

 can discover of the occurrence of the Capercaillie in Suther- 

 land beyond Sir Eobert Gordon's work already quoted ; but 

 Captain Houstoun, of Kintradwell, Brora, writes to me 

 that one, Donald Sutherland (or Donald Mhor), used to men- 

 tion the Capercaillie as having belonged to this county ; but 

 Donald Mhor, who died about twelve years ago, at the age of 

 ninety — as the Eev. Dr. James M. Joass informs me — may 

 have spoken from traditionary evidence, or of his father having 

 seen it ; or he may even have been quoting from Sir Eobert 

 Gordon's work.^ 



^ Mr. Buxton may also have had in view the statements of its occurrence 

 at Dowally in the ' Old Stat. Acct.' (loc. cit), or that of its former occurrence in 

 Fortingall Parish, given in the 'New Stat. Acct. of Perthshire ' {loc. cit., p. 543), 

 where it is stated that "we had at one time the Capercailzie (caper-coille), or 

 great cock of the wood." 



2 The oldest pine trees in Sutherland are at Invercassley, on the opposite 

 side of the river Cassley from Eosehall, and are now veiy few in number, as I 

 am informed by my friend JNIr. Thomas Mackenzie. " The Eosehall wood 

 comes next, and dates from 1806. The Balblair wood, situated between Dor- 

 noch and Golspie, was planted about 1809 — the same year that the small 

 plantations of pine-woods about Kilcolmkill, in Strathbrora and Kintradwell, 

 on the coast, were also put down in. These are the only standing woods in 

 the county that have any pretensions to antiquity, the fir-woods on the Skibo 

 estate being comparatively recent. " Mr. Mackenzie comes to the conclusion 

 that there is not a standing pine tree in Sutherland which is a hundred years 

 old» 



