62 A NEW AGRICULTURAL POLICY 



readily storm in winter, and very rarely, if 

 ever, have sheep been hand-fed there. . . . 

 I have further a wide knowledge of similar 

 lands cleared of stock in Argyllshire, Perth- 

 shire, and Inverness-shire, a great part of which 

 is adapted to sheep-farming. ... It is very 

 unfair that sheep are fenced off from deer 

 forests while the deer range all over the sheep 

 land, destroying and eating up the best of the 

 grass. I know deer forests where, in a storm, 

 not one deer remains in the forest ; they are 

 all down on the sheep land, where every knoll 

 cleared of snow is covered with them. I 

 challenge issue with parties who maintain that 

 deer will live on high land where sheep are 

 unable to make a living. If deer were strictly 

 confined to the Highlands there would soon 

 be an end of them." 



It appears from the above that an owner, 

 even in war-time, would displace sheep for deer, 

 and an Agricultural Committee could effect 

 but very little change in the displacement. 



We have on record that whereas during the 

 few years prior to the War our agricultural 

 population decreased by 16 per cent., game- 

 keepers increased by 25 per cent., and although 

 during the War a certain number of game- 

 keepers were turned into soldiers, whilst others 

 joined the volunteers, or looked after poultry, 

 it seems, judging by the amount of game pre- 

 serving going on to-day, by the size of 



