66 FIELD AND FERN. 



reluctant good-bye to Kintradwell, we ride on past 

 the deep, copper pool at Brora Bridge, seven miles by 

 the coast to Golspie. Along the hill-side to the right 

 are the cottages with their plots of ground, which 

 were allotted to those Highlanders who would not 

 emigrate when they were ordered to quit the glens. 

 It was doubtless a sharp sermon, and rendered 

 doubly so by the stern opposition; bat even the tra- 

 ditions of "hame" will, as years go on, melt before 

 the conviction that chronic snuffing and shin-toasting 

 and rearing a few potatoes within a tumble-down 

 wall are not the mission of a Highlander. They were 

 taken from that useless existence to a spot where 

 they have full exercise for their energies both by sea 

 and land. It was a readjustment, very bitter to the 

 Highland heart, but still wholesome and right, as 

 sheep were placed where there ought to be sheep, 

 and men where there ought to be men. 



Beyond Brora we skirt the Uppat woods, and for the 

 first time in our life we scan a roebuck, "a perfect form 

 in perfect rest," actually standing motionless under 

 a fir-tree at twenty paces. With all the wisdom of 

 the rook, it calmly surveys our gunless friend, Wil- 

 liam Houstoun, who, almost tortured to frenzy at the 

 sight, gasps out that it has a three-year-old head, 

 and begs us, out of sheer mercy to him, to halloo it 

 away. West Highlanders, black faces, and " ponies 

 for the hill" are the joint-tenants of the Dunrobin 

 policy ; and a turn up an avenue to the right brings 

 us to the castle steading, whose dun and brindled 



