CHIEF LOCALITIES TOK, GROUSE. 63 



enamoured, lies all to the 7ioTth. To go to the moors is known to 

 be almost synonymous with going to some of the northern localities 

 of the kmgdom. Pormeiiy tliis was not so exclusively the case. 

 'There used to be found considerahle quantities of black grouse in 

 the New Porest of Hampshire, in some places in Devonshire 

 Derbyshii-e, and Staffordshire; but it is now questionable if there 

 be any, either of this species of the grouse family, or of the red 

 gronse, in these parts ot England at the present day. The moors 

 of Yorkshii-e are the nearest spots where any portion of grouse can 

 ^readily be obtamed ; and even here, there has been for several years 

 a dnumution of their numbers progressively gomg on. The increase 

 of manufacturing and mining operations in this section of the king- 

 dom has been the chief cause of the decliae of grouse shootmg over 

 many of the fine districts of moorland in this direction. 



The cheap and rapid mode of travelling by raiLwav has, however, 

 ttoown open considerable tracts of moorland to the English shooter, 

 that were scarcely accessible before • he can traverse the country 

 troin London to the distant Highlands of Scotland ia a few hours, 

 and can find moors and game to his heart's content. There are 

 extensive ranges of grousing country near home ; the moors of 

 Westmoreland, Cumberland, and Northumberland, are very exten- 

 ^ve, and there are great numbers of grouse upon them, of all kinds. 

 The shooting districts belonging to Lord Lowther, in Westmore- 

 land, are immense, the sportsman may walk thirty miles and scarcely 

 get beyond them :_ here the country is so wild, bleak, and moun- 

 tainous, that a guide is always requisite for strangers, and a pocket 

 compass indispensable. The Cumberland moors are likewise very 

 i fruitful of grouse, in some of theii- localities- and here too, the 

 country is^ exceedingly wild and rugged. Li the neighbourhood of 

 Hexham, in Northumberland, and iii the moors belonging to the 

 Dulvc of Northumberland, at Keilder Castle, there is a goodly por- 

 tion of grouse, and the range of country is a very interesting one ia 

 point of scenery. 



But the great moor tracts in Scotland are the chief places for 

 fiiidmg an abundance of sport ; the whole country, with the excep- 

 tion of a few miles of cultivated land, here and there, by the sides 

 I of some river or estuary, is one immense moor, broken into artificial 

 divisions by high and lofty momitains, covered at their summits, ia 

 some instances, with eternal snows. This is the sportsman's land 

 of promise— the land flowing with ''the milk and honey" of hi& 

 amusement. We can conceive nothing more heart-stirring and 

 exhilarating than a tour to those wild tracts in search of the grouse, 

 where Nature appears in her roughest attire and rugged grandeur. 



This comparatively Alpine country can now, by railway and 

 steamboat, be threaded in aU its localities, at a very small cost of 

 tune and money. The sportsman can transport himself, in a-few 

 hours, from one spot to another a couple of hundred miles distant^, 

 and this gives him a great command of the whole country. If one 

 spot is not equal to his expectations, he can remove himself and 



