258 Notes on Sport a7id Travel i 



selves and our plaids out to dry on the top of the 

 big stone and wait till they do come.' 



If you look at your map, you will find the word 

 ' Sutherland ' written over across a far larger tract 

 than is encased within the hills that bound our 

 horizon, but for all that a large proportion of Suther- 

 land proper is visible from our station on the shoulder 

 of Ben Clebric. In old times Strathnaver was really 

 independent of Sutherland, though the Earl of that 

 ilk was the feudal chief of the Lords of Reay, and 

 had forest -rights in the Reay-country. Sutherland 

 was the land south, not only of Caithness, but of 

 Strathnaver. Besides Strathnaver, there were the 

 districts of Eddrachillis and Assynt, quite distinct 

 from Sutherland, inhabited by different races and 

 governed by their own chiefs ; the latter, indeed, 

 belonged more to the ' Lord of the Isles ' than to 

 Scotland proper : the great county of Sutherland 

 was only welded into its present form in very recent 

 times. I cannot now, sitting up here on a big stone, 

 with the wind blowing clean through me, giving me 

 the sensation of being clothed in a fishing-net of 

 more than legal mesh, attempt to unravel the tangled 

 web of the ancient history of Caithness and Suther- 

 land ; which was first peopled, and why every little 

 province was at eternal war with its neighbours. 

 Even Sir Robert Gordon, who spent his whole life 

 in rummaging out the traditions of the country, 

 becomes puzzled and puzzling on the subject He 

 believes that Caithness should be read Catti-ness, 



