WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS 



whisky, which certainly was of unusual flavour and pot- 

 ency. 



Tuesday. — We were off again by daybreak. I will pass 

 by several minor adventures, but one cannot be omitted. 

 Malcolm went with us to show us where he had last seen 

 the track. As we crossed a long reach of black and broken 

 ground, the first ascent from the valley, two golden eagles 

 rose out of a hollow at som^ distance. Their flightwas lazy 

 and heavy, as if gorged with food, and on examining the 

 place we found the carcass of a sheep half eaten, one of 

 Malcolm's flock. He vowed vengeance; and, merelypoint- 

 ing out to us our route, returned for a spade to dig a place 

 of hiding near enough the carcass to enable him to have a 

 shot at the eagles if theyshould return. We held on ourway, 

 and the greater part of the day without any luck to cheer 

 us, my resolution "not to be beat" being, however, a good 

 deal strengthened by the occasional grumbling of Donald. 

 Towards the afternoon, when we had tired ourselves with 

 looking with our glasses at every corrie in that side of the 

 hill, at length, in crossing a bare and boggy piece of ground, 

 Donald suddenly stopped, with a Gaelic exclamation, and 

 pointed — and there, to be sure, was a full fresh foot-print, 

 the largest mark of a deer either of us had ever seen.There 

 was no more grumbling. Both of us were instantlyas much 

 on the alert as when we started on our adventure. We traced 

 the track as long as the ground would allow. Where we 

 lost it, it seemed to point down the little burn, which soon 

 lost itself to our view in a gorge of bare rocks. We pro- 

 ceeded now very cautiously, and taking up our station on 

 a concealed ledge of one of the rocks, began to search the 



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