IN THE HIGHLANDS 215 



than the resident ganger. Alas ! when the wicked 

 Commissioners of Excise went in for * riding officers * 

 and a squad of horrid coastguard sailors with long, iron- 

 pointed walking-sticks for poking about wherever earth 

 seemed to have been lately disturbed, it ended all peace 

 and comfort in smuggling, for these rascals ransacked 

 every unenclosed bit of country within their limits each 

 month; accordingly, the ganger soon began to be the 

 most detested of men. 



" In the good old times, when we were going to shoot, 

 my mother often called Hector Cameron, our dear 

 shooting help, gave him a tin can, and desired him to 

 bring it back with barm — i.e., yeast. It never occurred 

 to her that we might fail to meet with a bothy where 

 brewing was carried on ere we came home. I have been 

 in several during an ordinary day's walk in moor or wood, 

 and of course had a mug of sweet ' wort ' or a drop of 

 dew and drank to the brewer's good luck. In those 

 days we baked at home, and as barm from the recognised 

 beer-makers was generally bitter from the hops used, 

 and my mother and we children could not eat bitter 

 bread, what could the dear soul do but prefer barm from 

 the smugglers ? On the watershed between Strath Bran 

 and Fannich, in sight almost of the road in Strath Bran, 

 between Dingwall and Lochcarron, and on the hill road 

 from Strath Bran to Lechky, within a few yards of its 

 many passengers, I have been in a bothy with regularly 

 built, low stone walls, watertight heather thatch, iron 

 pipes leading cold spring water to the still-rooms, and 

 such an array of casks, tubs, etc., as told that gangers 

 never troubled their owners. They sometimes troubled 

 malt barns, or rather caves. Once when shooting I fell 



