152 A HUNDRED YEARS 



ground that I once saw a terrier manage to scramble 

 up into a nest full of young ones. It did not relish 

 the unusual experience, as, unlike the eagle's, the heron's 

 means of defence is his powerful bill, with which even a 

 young one is very handy. One day we thought we 

 would visit our heronry, and as we approached the island 

 we were much surprised at seeing no herons flying about 

 as usual. On our landing there was nothing to be seen 

 but upset nests and quantities of feathers everywhere, 

 and in one holly-bush we found a full-growTi dead young 

 heron, covered with blood, but still intact. 



We could not imagine what had happened, and thought 

 some evil four-footed beast like a fox must have swum 

 to the island, or perhaps a wild-cat or marten, which are 

 better at climbing trees than a fox. We had some 

 strychnine with us to give poisoned eggs to a pair of 

 hoodies in another island, and we decided to poison the 

 young heron whose body had escaped being eaten, in 

 the hope that we might thus discover the cause of the 

 terrible destruction ; so we laid its poisoned carcase on a 

 flat rock on the island. A few days afterwards a dead 

 eagle was washed up on the shore of the loch opposite 

 the island, thus making it quite clear to us that an eagle, 

 or more probably a pair of eagles, had done all this 

 mischief. 



We have had far too many eagles in our country of 

 late, and when one can see seven in the air at once it is 

 about time to thin them out. I have only once in my 

 life taken an eagle's nest, and that was sixty-eight years 

 ago. We never set traps for eagles, but when one is 

 caught I must confess we do not mourn very much. 



