A PTARMIGAN DAY. 219 



West Highland districts never produces an incon- 

 veniently heavy game-bag. An attendant, there- 

 fore, is little needed, except to give advice, which 

 a man who knows the nature and habits of this 

 bird, has a quick and keen eye, and a brace of 

 steady dogs used to the sport, is far better 

 without. 



In the year 1862, grouse had bred badly (owing 

 to late snows) on the Kuron, the wild stretch of 

 moorland I have just sketched, and which forms 

 the principal range of the Glenfalloch shootings. 

 My second son and I had good sport, however, on 

 the two smaller beats, averaging from 20 to 30 

 brace during August and the first weeks of Sep- 

 tember. The weather also had been very pro- 

 pitious till then, when it broke, and a fair day 

 w T as a rarity. Wishing to spare the Kuron, and 

 having shot down the full complement that the 

 other moors would bear, I had for a fortnight 

 been looking wistfully towards the ptarmigan 

 hills. Each morning they were enclosed with 

 fogs, and the weather itself was aptly described 

 by an old Highland " kimmer" as " shoory, 

 shoory, shoory, an' rain between." 



