298 APPENDIX. 



Dornoch Firth in the south. The hills, which from the 

 Orel to Helmsdale rise close to the sea, after passing the 

 latter place begin to recede farther and farther inland, thus 

 leaving an intervening flat, varying from one to two miles in 

 breadth, which is mostly under cultivation ; in two places 

 — Dunrobin and the Little Ferry — woods take the place 

 of fields, which here come down to the sea. At several 

 points along this line rocks crop up, which resist to a 

 certain extent the ravages of the sea, though the latter is 

 encroaching in some places very rapidly. 



The whole of this eastern sea-board, which is rather 

 more than twenty -five miles in extent, presents but little 

 variety, the sandhills, which commence on the southern 

 side of the Helmsdale river, continuing with little inter- 

 mission to the Dornoch Firth. The beach affords a con- 

 venient nesting -place to such birds as the Arctic tern, 

 oyster-catcher, and ringed plover, and sheldrakes breed 

 in the rabbit-burrows in the sandhills. Wherever there 

 are sandy cliffs high enough to afford a secure nesting- 

 place, jackdaws build in numbers, and these do great 

 havoc amongst the eggs of the terns and oyster-catchers. 



Certain rocks which are bare at half tide are frequented 

 by seals, mostly the Gray seal (Halichcerus gryphus), the 

 Firth seal (Phoca vitulina) being less common along the 

 open shore, though very abundant both in the Dornoch 

 Firth and at the Little Ferry. On one occasion the Harp 

 seal (Phoca Greenlandica) has been shot by Mr. Houstoun of 

 Kintradwell, but its value not being sufficiently known, 

 only the skin was preserved, and this was afterwards cut 

 up for various purposes. 



The wave of migration seems almost entirely to leave 

 the Sutherland coast untouched, and this may account for 

 the very small numbers of migratory waders that are to 

 be seen, even in such an apparently favourable locality 

 as the Little Ferry : a few bar - tailed godwits appear 

 now and then, but even dunlins are scarce ; the mussel- 

 scalps attract great numbers of oyster-catchers ; and in 

 hard weather a good many golden plovers, driven off the 

 hills, come down to the shores. The only gray plover 



