SEPTEMBER 343 



market against the imported Dutch and American article, and as 

 it does not pay to ship young cattle to the mainland, the throats 

 of most of the pedigree calves are cut so soon as they are born. 

 When I told Hood this, by the way, he said little and turned the 

 subject, intimating thereby, I think, that it was of no use wasting 

 good travellers' tales upon a person of his experience. Yet the 

 thing is true. Another obstacle to the success of farming in Coll 

 is the deficiency of labour, which, if such a thing be possible, seems 

 to be even scarcer than it is becoming here at home. 



To-day we went out shooting. Here I will stop to explain 

 that to a certain kind of sportsman, at any rate, Coll is a perfect 

 paradise, and, although I am but a moderate shot, I trust that I 

 may be numbered as one of that honourable army. Perhaps, 

 however, there is no name so vilely misapplied as this of ' sports- 

 man.' The bruiser, the racing tout, the trap-shooter, and others 

 equally ignoble, are all ' sportsmen.' Sportsmen, also, are those 

 who take great 'shoots' with the object of killing the hugest 

 amount of game possible and seeing the reports of their prowess in 

 the papers. Woe be to the man whose poor performance diminishes 

 such a total ! Never shall I forget the story of a gentleman whom 

 once I knew, who, under some misapprehension as to the extent 

 of his skill with a gun, was asked to one of these colossal and 

 advertising ' shoots.' His very first stand happened to be at a spot 

 where, for about twenty minutes, pheasants and hares passed him 

 in an incessant stream. Furiously did he aim and bang, till, at 

 the conclusion of the beat, he found himself surrounded by a piled 

 up ring of cartridge cases, while almost at his feet lay an un- 

 fortunate hen-pheasant, the only thing that he had succeeded in 

 hitting, blown absolutely to pieces. He paused and mopped his 

 brow, and looking round him in the vain hope of discovering some 

 other trophies of his fiery labours, for the first time perceived a 

 little boy with a knife and an ash stick in his hand, sheltering 

 himself behind the bole of an oak. 



* You beastly little boy,' he said, for his temper was somewhat 

 ruffled, ' what are you doing there ? ' 



