AND STIRLINGSHIRE HUNT 



Barnton to Hamilton, hunt all day and be back 

 again at night by changing hacks at Cumbernauld. 

 In order to have done so he must have risen 

 early and retired to rest late, and when, from 

 a measurement of the Ordnance Survey map, it 

 is ascertained that the distance as the crow 

 flies from Barnton to Cumbernauld and thence 

 to Hamilton is all but forty miles, it is obvious 

 that he must have traversed at least eighty 

 miles besides hunting, — a performance which can 

 only be described as wonderful. But Mr Ramsay, 

 who loved hunting with his whole heart, would 

 no doubt consider such a journey and the con- 

 sequent bodily fatigue merely as the means to 

 an end, and reckon these lightly so long as that 

 end was attained. 



There has been preserved a slim little volume, 

 which, although unpretentious in appearance, pos- 

 sesses much that is of interest, since it contains 

 the first records of sport. It is Mr Ramsay's 

 hunting diary,^ and in its pages are to be found 

 a brief account of each day's doings in the field, 

 the names of his hunters, and frequent notes of 

 his weight. The diary, which is forcibly expressed 

 — the present tense being used almost throughout 

 in describing the events which occurred — is so 

 early in date and gives so much information in 

 regard to the country hunted, that it has been 

 thought desirable to reproduce it. Those there- 



1 In the possession of Mr Keith Ramsay Maitland, Edinburgh. 



47 



