246 Notes on Sport and Travel i 



of it into the hut — you will get a very tolerable idea 

 of a superior description of that happy home of the 

 western Highlander, — the black hut — from which he 

 has been so ruthlessly torn. If you doubt it, go 

 and see for yourself, on the West coast and more 

 particularly on the islands. Suppose a man and 

 his wife, and half-a-dozen children, with, in all 

 probability, one, if not two, grandfathers and grand- 

 mothers, living in such a hovel, depending entirely 

 on the miserable crops of oats or potatoes, without 

 the remotest chance of a paid day's work from one 

 year's end to the other, and you have the sort of 

 existence Donald Dhu would have led in the good 

 old times. 



* I suppose he is not very much overpaid now, is 

 he, Donald ? ' 



' 'Deed, sir, he's no that ill off ; he gets good 

 wages, a certain number of sheep to himself, lives 

 rent-free, finds himself in oatmeal for two or three 

 shillings a week, and gets plenty of braxy.' 



' What is braxy ; dead sheep, is it not ? ' 



Well, it is dead sheep ; but only sheep that die 

 from rapid inflammation at certain times of the year. 

 It is questionable whether it is particularly whole- 

 some, but at any rate the shepherds do pretty well 

 on it. It requires preparation, however ; salting and 

 pressing, and other little manipulations, which, when 

 carefully described by an enthusiast in the art, are 

 quite enough to make one certain that it is what 

 Dame Juliana Berners would call ' an ill meat for a 



