192 DAYS OF DEER-STALKING. 



extent, that the proprietors of forests found it necessary to 

 combine in order to protect their mutual interests. In the 

 " Collectanea de rebus Albanicis" of the lona Club, there is 

 a contract, dated November 3, 1628, between several of the 

 principal Highland lairds " for the preservation of deer and 

 roe on their respective estates, and the punishment of tres- 

 passers ; mutually binding themselves to respect each other's 

 forests, and cause them to be respected by their retainers, 

 under special penalties, according to the rank of the person 

 transgressing : a hundred merks for a gentleman, with for- 

 feiture of the hagbute or bow ; 40 for a tenant ; and, in 

 case of a common man, " his body to be punishit according 

 as pleises the superior of the forest : ane witness sufficient." 

 They appear to have had a sort of jury trial for poachers. 



There are several old Acts of the Scottish Parliament 

 " anent steilors of hart, hynd, roe, and doe, to be punishit as 

 thift, and anent shuitteries at Thame ; quhilk is appointed 

 to be punishit with death, and escheit of their gudes move- 

 able." These laws have been reckoned barbarous, but they 

 are not more severe than those which, in former times, were 

 in force against sheep-stealers, taking likewise into consi- 

 deration, that sheep are of infinitely less value than deer. 

 If it be true that deer wander from one forest to another, so 

 that no laird can claim a certain property in them, it is also 

 obvious that the common poacher can have no right in any 

 case, and must steal from some one or another. The claim 

 can rest with the landed proprietors only. It is a fair give 

 and take business according to the direction of the wind ; 

 your third man, however, steps in, and I think enjoys the 

 sport much more than those who are privileged to follow it. 

 In the "History of Badenoch," it is mentioned that Cluny 

 Macpherson deprived a man of his arm, and of one of his 

 eyes, who killed deer afterwards in this mutilated condition. 

 I do not mean to defend the lawless proceedings of poachers, 

 but I cannot help confessing that there is something so 

 adventurous, and so full of picturesque character in these 

 rough fellows so much skill exhibited by them, and such 

 endurance of climate and fatigue, as may in some degree be 

 admitted as extenuating qualities ; and I would not, as 

 Shakspeare's town-clerk says, "condemn them to everlasting 



