CHAPTER XV 

 SMUGGLING AND SHEEP-STEALING 



A BOOK dealing with the Highlands could not be con- 

 sidered complete if it omitted to tell something about the 

 drinking habits and about smuggling in the old days. 

 So I quote once more from my uncle : 



" I never saw or heard of champagne, hock, claret, 

 etc., on our table, only madeira, sherry, and port of the 

 best quality that could be procured. In my father's 

 day, and long after, doctors and every other person 

 were satisfied that health depended greatly on the 

 quantity of ' good ' liquor a person swallowed daily. 

 I have seen, though not in our home, men of note glad 

 of the help of the wall on entering the drawing-room 

 after dinner, until a chair or a sofa came within reach. 



" I heard him say that once, going unexpectedly to 

 Gairloch without sending notice beforehand, he was 

 surprised by the want of the usual joy on his appearing, 

 and was sure something was wrong. It turned out that 

 a vessel loaded with brandy, claret, etc., had been chased 

 into the bay by a revenue cutter, and willing hands had 

 carried the cargo into Tigh Dige, into which my father had 

 to enter by a ladder through a window. The revenue 

 folk never dreamed of looking for the casks in Tigh Dige. 



" Once, when there on my Edinburgh holiday, the 

 Rover's Bride anchored in the bay, and the skipper, 

 James Macdonald, as popular a man as ever stood in 



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