i 4 COUNTRY LIFE 



we can feel the throb of his pulses and hear the 

 beating of his heart. There were heads in the land, 

 too, in those days heads of ten, with brow, brae, and 

 trae antlers in perfection, such as are seldom to be seen 

 nowadays save hanging upon the walls of the shooting- 

 lodges. Deer have increased with over-preserving, 

 but rifles of precision and improved practice have 

 been doing their work, and the harts that promise 

 to be the pride of the forest are seldom suffered to 

 attain maturity. " Life has little better to offer than 

 this," Dr. Johnson observed on one occasion, when 

 thoroughly enjoying himself in the Highlands, devoted 

 as he was to Fleet Street. The deer-stalker might say 

 as much with far more reason when following his solitary 

 sport in the valleys of the Tilt and the Bruar, and 

 about the skirts of the witch-haunted hill of Ben-y- 

 gloe, while he had the refinements and luxuries of 

 society within his reach at the Castle of Blair or the 

 lodge in Glen Tilt. 



Talking of the deterioration in the heads of deer, 

 and apropos to general changes for the worse in the 

 wild life of the moors and mountains, in consequence 

 of the ever-increasing demand for shooting-quarters, 

 we may refer to a delightful little brochure by Mr. 

 Colquhoun on the Fer<e nature of the British Isles. 

 For keepers have been increasing too, and persecuting 

 everything they are pleased to call vermin with a 

 zeal that is born of ignorance and prejudice. There 

 are beasts and birds for which we have nothing to 

 say. Kill down hooded crows and magpies as fast 



