AMONGST THE HEATHER. 41 



Milbank's famous bag of 728 grouse on Wemmergill Moors, 

 August 20, 1872, in our minds, the following passage, concern- 

 ing the gallant Colonel's achievements amongst the heather, is 

 sufficiently amusing to the present generation : 



" I had had some suspicions that my famous treble battle- 

 powder had received damage from a leak in the Falcon sloop, 

 and this day's shooting fully convinced me of it. I never knew 

 powder hang so much, and always firing dull \ but there was 

 no remedy. With good powder, I verily believe I could have 

 killed thirty brace presently ; " and then he takes the trouble 

 to add, " Pero, Ponto, Dargo, Shandy, Carlo, and Romp, all 

 whelps, behaved incomparably." * 



Most enthusiastic of all sportsmen, however, when clad in 

 his shooting-jacket and his feet on his native heather, is Chris- 

 topher North. Who does not know his athletic frame, as he 

 appears in Duncan's picture, leaning on his gun, his hat flung 

 on the bank at his side, and his grand massive head and neck, 

 such as Ajax might have envied, thrown back, as he sniffs the 

 fresh moorland breeze, and, with kindling eye, breaks out into 

 those eloquent rhapsodies wherewith he was wont to charm the 

 last generation ? What proud exultation for every gallant deed 

 done of old on Scotch ground, and for all the rugged ballads 

 that tell of them, now fires his heart ! Again, what keen delight 

 in all the sports to which those heather-clads hills invite impels 

 him to burst into ecstasies of excited yet wonderful description ! 

 We pant after him in vain, as he breasts the corrie, intent on 

 reaching the deer, unsuspiciously feeding behind the mountain's 

 shoulder ; now he leaves us far behind, as he stalks up the 

 brae, " like a king rejoicing in his strength," while we, weakly 

 mortals, painfully clamber below him, to shoot the ptarmigan 

 on its summit ; and again he reclines on the heather, mingling 

 philosophic disquisition with recitations from Homer and 

 Burns ; next moment to be rushing downwards to join a cours- 



* Thornton's Sporting Tour, p. 151. London, 1804. 



