IN THE HIGHLANDS 141 



He grinned with horrid glee when telling the tale, like 

 a Monadh Liath poacher in whose bothy I was once 

 benighted, and from whom I heard many a shooting 

 story. 



'* Once in a heavy snow-storm not far from Killin 

 in Inverness-shire he found about fifty deer packed 

 together like sheep in a fank* below a rock for some 

 shelter. He crept close above them and let fly a handful 

 of slugs among them. Five stopped where they were, 

 and two more went only about one hundred yards, 

 when they also stopped. His brother was a Killin 

 shepherd living on the west side of the loch, the east side 

 of which was under birch, where deer were frequently 

 seen among the trees from his door. If his salting barrel 

 was getting empty he never needed a gun to refill it, 

 but went round the loch, guided by his daughter's signs, 

 till just above the deer. Then he stalked down close 

 to them, and by hounding on his two very good collies 

 he seldom failed to make one of the deer take to the loch 

 and swim across. Just before it landed his daughter 

 would rise up in front of it, working an old umbrella 

 for all she was worth and advising the deer to recross 

 the loch. This it did, not noticing the shepherd or his 

 dogs till again about to land, when the sight of them 

 made it start for another swim. Thus the shepherd and 

 his daughter so wore it out that a drowned deer W3,s 

 found in the loch — and of course there could be no 

 harm in using it for food '/' 



* Enclosure 



