156 FIELD NOTES FOR THE YEAR. 



some distance before I could stop them. As long as he 

 continued ringing his bell through this cover I seldom saw 

 any other roe in it, although at other times it was a favourite 

 resort of these beautiful creatures. Once it followed, for 

 some distance towards Darnaway, a servant who had been 

 accustomed to feed and pet it, but taking alarm at some 

 people at work in a field, it turned back again. I do not 

 know what was the end of the pretty animal, but towards the 

 winter it disappeared, and I fear it was shot by some poaching 

 fellow whilst feeding in the fields where it was often seen. 

 Its silver bell made it both an easier and a more valuable 

 victim. 



August 12th. On this (to so many people) dies memorabilia, 

 whilst shooting with a friend in Inverness-shire, I found a 

 few old grouse lying dead, killed by the prevailing disease, 

 which of late years has committed such havoc among these 

 birds in certain districts ; some which we killed were already 

 attacked by it. Whenever this was the case we invariably 

 observed that the plumage of the bird was much altered, 

 having a rusty red appearance instead of the fine rich colour 

 characteristic of the grouse. The feathers, too, had an 

 unnatural kind of dry ness about them, which gave the bird a 

 bleached, unhealthy look. In those grouse which I opened 

 myself the presence of the disease was indicated by the liver 

 being apparently rotten. 



Whatever is the cause of this mortality, it is a matter of 

 some consequence to the proprietors of those districts where 

 the grouse shootings let for as high or a higher rent than the 

 sheep pasturage ; for it can scarcely be expected that 

 Englishmen will continue paying at the rate they do for the 

 right of shooting over tracts of ground where the grouse are 

 becoming almost extinct, as is the case in several places. 

 Instead of sparing the birds where they are attacked by this 

 epidemic, I should be much more inclined to shoot down 

 every grouse in the infected parts of the hills ; and I would 

 continue to do this as long as any appearance of the disease 

 remained. I would then give them a year or two of rest, 

 according to the numbers and appearance of the birds. This 

 seems to me the most likely way to check the destruction 

 caused by what the keepers call the " grouse disease." In 

 some parts of the Highlands there were scarcely any young 

 birds seen in August, and the old grouse were picked up in 

 dozens, dead on the heather 



