THE VALUE OF DEER FORESTS 287 



and all, gun in hand, for the alleged purpose of destroying 

 vermin, under the influence of whisky, and ripe, in conjunction 

 with some of the shepherds, for a shot or a run at anything that 

 may start before him. Now, were I Lochiel, I would order my 

 gamekeepers sedulously to destroy the foxes, quietly and most 

 efficiently by trap and poison (dear reader, remember there are 

 no hounds here), and the tenants, too, should be requested to 

 permit their shepherds to put their shoulders to the wheel, to rid 

 the lambs of their enemy, without calling for extraneous assistance. 

 Half his life the shepherd basks, blinking idly in the sun on the 

 mountain side, or sits doing nothing in the sheltered corner of a 

 rock ; or very frequently amuses himself with finding a deer lying 

 in some corrie accessible to the gun, for which he hies back to 

 his cottage. Now, if these worthies were directed, in their idle 

 hours, being on the spot, to trap the foxes, and a few traps 

 assigned them, the " tod-hunter " might be dispensed with. I 

 admit that the sort of trap they must use is dangerous in dis- 

 honest hands, where there are blue hares and winged game, still 

 I think that, though it might demand a little more vigilance in 

 the keepers, yet, the interests of the deer forest, which, after all, 

 are the chief thing, would be better maintained. At all events, 

 an irresponsible intruder, guns, dogs, and noise, would be got 

 rid of; and every one knows what a boon that would be to the 

 deer on the wild mountains of Lochiel. 



The time has arrived I am about to assert a curious fact, 

 and one which those blind revolutionists and hazardous reformers 

 (I speak in sense parliamentary), Messrs. Cobden, Bright, 

 Charles Villiers, and Sir William Molesworth, might not have 

 been prepared for when machinery has made the wild stag of 

 the Highlands of more value than the sheep ; and, hear it, ye 

 disciples of the Manchester school, who, while you preach the 

 disbanding of the public soldier, yet are the first to call for his 

 protection ; and who find yourselves obliged to shoot, by private 

 hands, your own refractory turn-outs at your mills and coal-pits, 

 as at this moment at Wigan, the wild stag is affording more 

 employment to the surrounding or local labouring population 



