124 Modern Dogs. 



hounds, and St. Clair, in a suitable place, uncoupled 

 his favourites in sight of the flying deer. St. Clair 

 followed on horseback, and as the deer reached the 

 middle of the brook, he in despair, believing his 

 wager already lost, and his life as good as gone, 

 leaped from his horse. At this critical moment, 

 " Hold " stopped her quarry in the brook, and 

 " Help " coming up, the deer was turned, and in 

 the end killed within the stipulated boundary. The 

 king, not far behind, was soon on the scene, and 

 embracing his subject, " bestowed on him the lands 

 of Kirton, Logan House, Earncraig, &c., in free 

 forestrie." Scrope says the tomb of this Sir William 

 Clair, on which he appears sculptured in armour, 

 with a greyhound (deerhound) at his feet, is still to 

 be seen in Rosslyn Chapel. 



Thomson Gray in his "Dogs of Scotland " (1890), 

 tells us that the earliest mention of deerhounds 

 appears in 1528, in Pitcott's History of that country, 

 wherein it is stated that " the king desired all gentle- 

 men that had dogs that were good, to bring them to 

 hunt in the said boundaries, which most of the noble- 

 men of the Highlands did, such as the Earls of 

 Huntley, Argyle, and Athole, who brought their 

 deerhounds with them, and hunted with His Majesty. 



However, about this time, and for many years 

 later, a common but erroneous idea prevailed, that 



