372 SPORT IN EUROPE 



taken for granted that each stag costs the party hiring a deer-forest 

 ^25 a head ; or in other words, a forest yielding twenty-five stags 

 would cost ^625. It has often been fiercely argued by political 

 agitators and others that the preservation of deer was a curse to 

 Scotland and an injustice to the people, but in my humble opinion 

 it has helped in a great measure to the prosperity of that country. 

 Where the deer roam on the mountain heights of Perthshire, Ross- 

 shire, Inverness-shire, and Aberdeenshire, in nearly every instance 

 nothing could exist but sheep. This at first sight looks bad ; sheep 

 are doubtless good for human wants, whilst venison is certainly a 

 luxury. But which bring the most money to a district, sheep or 

 deer? Ten thousand acres of sheep ground can be attended to by 

 one shepherd and two collie dogs. The shepherd lives principally 

 on porridge, washed down occasionally by "mountain dew"; the same 

 tract as a deer-forest means instantly money flowing into the district. 

 There must be stalkers, gillies, ponies, stores, and all the necessaries 

 for a rich man's establishment. And Scotland, or at any rate the 

 mountains and glens of Scotland, and the villages and people therein, 

 thrive and exist well, because these great game farms bring money 

 to them. 



Turn and look at the dilapidated state of the glens and mountains 

 in the sister island. Ireland has mountains, and moors, and rivers 

 quite as fine, where grouse and partridge, deer and hare, salmon and 

 all other game that thrive in Scotland were plentiful, but poaching, 

 and free gunning, and netting and trapping on land and in rivers 

 has reduced the quantity of game to a fearfully low state. In many 

 places there is absolutely nothing left. And are the people happier 



