OUR FIRST STAG. 35 



Donald and Walter began to soothe their disappointed 

 feelings with that everlasting resource, a pipe, while I 

 mused over our misadventure, or noted the striking 

 points of the scenery before us. Donald informed us 

 that the chasm in the rocks, to which I have more than 

 once alluded, was named in Gaelic after a spectre- 

 hunter, whose favourite position it had been. He used 

 to take his stand in the chasm in a kind of niche in the 

 rock, and, as the deer jostled and drove each other 

 past him, he would select the best, and, stabbing him 

 with a long hunting-knife, extract the heart, that being 

 his daily food, and leave the carcase for the wolf or 

 eagle. Donald added that, though he could not say 

 how far there was truth in the tradition, he knew 

 people whose fathers had themselves seen many a fine 

 hart lying dead in the pass, slain by the spectre- 

 hunter's knife. 



The story was scarcely finished, the relation of which 

 was much more impressive, from the language and 

 looks of Donald, than I can make it, and I was just in 

 the act of rising to stretch myself, when I was very 

 roughly dragged down by Donald, who at the same 

 moment whispered in a low mysterious tone, " Bide a 

 wee, Sir ; bide a wee ! " and, indeed, I was only too 

 willing to take the hint, for within three hundred yards 

 of us was a noble stag coming gaily up the brae, in 

 perfect innocence of our vicinity. How he came there 

 we could not conceive, but there he was ; and, the 

 wind having chopped round in the last few minutes, 

 there was little danger of his winding us till he was at 

 least within shot. 



It was a most beautiful sight to see him throw up 

 his head and snuff the air, and then scratch his side 

 with his antlers, or crop the grass as he leisurely 

 approached. My pulse began to beat quickly, and I 



