1S90-91.] Birds of tJie Great Glen. 455 



suddenly wake the echoes Avith his loud sweet song — a sound 

 out of all proportion to tlie size of his body, and reminding 

 one, to a certain extent, of a powerful-voiced canary. The 

 only two' Saxicolinte are the whinchat and wheatear, the latter 

 about the first migrant to appear in spring. Strange to say, 

 the black-headed, red-breasted stonecliat does not exist, not- 

 withstanding that many portions of Glen Urquhart are suited 

 to its tastes and habits ; but among the whin- and broom- 

 covered parts nearer Fort Augustus it may be observed. 

 ISTevertheless, there is no blinking the fact that, take it all 

 over, this is a much scarcer bird than the two former. Last of 

 the minor woodland birds is the goldcrest, the smallest native 

 European species, so difficult to discover amongst the thick 

 spruces, and so baffling in its feeble mouse-squeaking sort of 

 note as almost to lead to the belief that it possesses veutri- 

 loquial powers. The latter assumption, however excusable, is 

 hardly correct, as the effect is produced more by the bird 

 shifting its quarters unobserved, than by any special gift in 

 the nature of polyphonism. 



The corn-crake in summer makes himself heard, though 

 not seen, by his unmusical and strident voice ; and the wood- 

 pigeons are, of course, familiar objects, greatly to the delight 

 of the agriculturist, whose grain suffers from their depreda- 

 tions in corresponding ratio to the size of the fields and the 

 number of the robbers. Game birds, as might be inferred 

 from the systematic onslaught on so-called " vermin," are 

 not the least conspicuous of the winged tribe. Black grouse 

 and red grouse are on the muirs, ptarmigan upon the upper 

 reaches of Mealfourvounie, partridges and woodcock in the 

 lower parts of the glen, snipe in the bogs, and any number 

 of pheasants in the woods. Eeeves's pheasant, with its mag- 

 nificent long tail, was numerous some years ago, and various 

 other varieties of the ordinary species were met with, includ- 

 ing the piebald and Bohemian, as also a bird crossed between 

 the golden pheasant and Phasianus colchicus. The caper- 

 cailzie or cock of the wood, so far as the indigenous race is 

 concerned, is a thing of the past, some of the last survivors 

 having been killed in Glen Moriston ; but the imported bird 

 was attempted to be domesticated by Lord Tweedmouth in 

 the vicinity of Guisachan, his residence in Strath Glass, with, 

 what success at the present time I am not aware. 



