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labour, due to the war, the forest was heavily 

 understaffed. There was only one stalker, Mac- 

 Dougall, one good pony and a shepherd, to do all 

 the work of bringing in stags and cutting them up, 

 whilst a keeper and a boy lent additional assistance 

 in dispatching the carcases, so generally we all had 

 to lend a hand at these onerous tasks, whilst for 

 the most part the actual hunting had to be done 

 by the sportsman working alone. Even without 

 local knowledge, I soon found that stalking alone 

 in such a forest as Fealar presented no grave diffi- 

 culties. The winds were, for the most part, con- 

 stant, and seldom tricky, whilst the only task was 

 learning the confines of each beat so as not to 

 interfere with one's brother sportsman. This small 

 trouble, however, was soon overcome by the aid 

 of a large-scale map. 



Fealar Lodge is situated high up amongst the 

 hills some twenty-two miles from Pitlochry, and 

 its inaccessibility has made it little known, but 

 adds much to its charm. An old fellow named 

 Milburn drove me in his dogcart from Pitlochry, 

 with one halt at Straloch, up the long Glenfernate 

 Glen and over the mountains by a rough mountain 

 road till we descended by tortuous ways to the 

 Forest Lodge. Even then he had to return for 

 the night to his home at Straloch, so his gallant 

 horse did not less than forty-eight miles that day, 

 an unusual effort for the Highlands. 



The following day (September 29th) my uncle and 

 I went north to the hills above Loch Tilt to fetch 

 in a small stag shot the previous day by Mr. Wedder- 

 burn. We took with us one Sandy, a local shepherd, 

 and a pony to carry the deer, and had not proceeded 



