I A Gossip on a Sutherland Hill-side 247 



queasy stomach,' and to make one especially shy of 

 pallid salt mutton in Highland districts. 



Swish ! what a drive of cold wind and rain as we 

 put our heads out of the bothy door. Never mind ; 

 we will get to the top of the ridge, perch ourselves 

 like a couple of scarts to the leeward of a big stone, 

 and wait for the clearing. 



Under this mass of gray gneiss let us sit down, 

 and gossip confidentially in a low voice, for there is 

 no knowing what may hear us. Few sounds do we 

 hear but the whispering of the wind among the 

 wet bents. Now and then the croak of the ravens, 

 waiting about the stag we killed yesterday, floats 

 down the wind, and the imperative * cr-u-u-u-uck- 

 go-back-go-back ' of the old cock grouse hints that 

 we are not entirely unnoticed in the mist ; and 

 there on a stone sits a golden plover, piping out the 

 saddest and wildest of bird music ; what has he 

 done to make himself so unutterably miserable ? 

 There he sits in the mist, wilfully solitary for the 

 time, giving utterance to a note which has an ex- 

 pression of the most intense broken heartedness, 

 perfectly indescribable ; I know of no inflection of 

 the human voice so unutterably mournful. He must 

 have lived with the Pechts, and be grieving over their 

 downfall. Throw a stone at him, Donald ; if I 

 listen to him for five minutes more I shall begin to 

 believe that Highland improvements are a delusion, 

 and that it is never going to stop raining. 



To make a small bull, I never heard a complete 



