388 THE GROUSE IN HEALTH AND IN DISEASE 



principles founded on observations made during the course of 

 the recent Inquiry, and shown by experience to be established 

 on a strong and certain base. 

 Keepers I n the first place it may be stated as a universal rule, and 



should be 



the owner's from this there should be no departure, that the keeper should 

 be the owner's and not the tenant's servant. The reasons for 

 this are many, and it would be hardly necessary to go into any 

 of them were it not that this somewhat obvious precept is as 

 often honoured in the breach as in the observance. 



A tenant, from the very definition of the term, is an in- 

 dividual possessing but a temporary interest in the moor he 

 rents. The tenant's keeper also, whose arrival and departure 

 synchronise with the period of his master's lease, naturally 

 looks to his immediate superior's interest rather than to the 

 future welfare of the estate, or of those permanently connected 

 with it. 



In cases of Grouse moors where the heather is well burned, 

 where there are no troubles connected with rabbits, sheep stock, 

 or rights-of-way, and where, broadly speaking, the interest of 

 both contracting parties are identical, difficulties may not occur ; 

 but this satisfactory state of affairs does not always exist. 



On a badly burned moor, with large tracts of rank, over- 

 grown heather, it is difficult to see how the immediate interests 

 of a progressive landlord and those of a shooting tenant on a 

 short lease can ever be made to coincide. If the landlord knows 

 his own interests, his first object must be to burn big stretches 

 of stick heather in order to get the moor into a proper rotation 

 of burning. The tenant, on the other hand, should he be 

 equally well informed, knows that though such heavy burning 

 may be beneficial to the moor in future years, the resulting crop 

 of edible heather will not be increased during his occupancy. 



The keeper, therefore, who burns in the tenant's interest 

 will burn in the smallest patches, not in order to increase the 

 food yield so much as to provide basking ground for the old 

 birds, and drying ground for the young chicks. He will leave 

 severely alone the big blocks of old or dying heather, for on these 



