68 FIELD AND FERN. 



Breadalbanes at Kelso, was bred by Dr. M'Gillivray 

 at Barra. The herd are not intended for showing, 

 but to keep up the breed or a stout cross ; and five 

 or six bull-calves are reserved every year to fill up 

 the ranks of the thirty, which are dispersed on ser- 

 vice from July to October among the tenants, as far 

 as Tongue and Lochinver. 



The head of one of them, with horns three feet 

 from tip to tip, guards the entrance of the Dunrobin 

 Museum, which is quite a key to the natural history 

 of the country. Assynt seems to have been a fatal 

 haunt both to the fox and the ring-tailed eagle, 

 which is irreverently labelled " carrion." Near them 

 is the wild- cat, one of the old die-hards which haunt 

 the cairns in the snow time and form the Duke of 

 Sutherland's crest. The marten-cat is nearly ex- 

 tinct ; but a polecat specimen is more easy to get, 

 when it has been routed by the aid of a muzzled 

 ferret out of its winter magazine of broken-spined 

 frogs. Jacko, the monkey, and late of the duke's 

 yacht, is the comic countryman of this still-life piece, 

 and, with upraised eye-glass, he cons " my marriage 

 lines." Feathered wanderers from over the sea 

 the roller (which looks like the kingfisher of the east), 

 the hoopoe, and the Bohemian waxwing have all 

 come to grief on their arrival, and share this dainty 

 Morgue with every Sutherland bird; and crystals 

 from Dunrobin Forest mingle harmoniously with an 

 elfin arrow-head of flint, and a ball from Moutrose's 

 last battle. The very wasps are represented by 



