236 DEER ALARMED. 



of the loch. But I was bent on other game. The 

 larder was getting low ; some yeld-hinds in good con- 

 dition had been reported to have been seen a day or 

 two before, and they were now the object of my 

 search. 



The ground for which we were making I had only 

 visited once before ; but I recollected sufficiently about 

 it to know that on a day still as the one before us we 

 should find stalking very difficult. Accordingly, that 

 no overhaste of ours might disturb the game, we called 

 at the cottage of a shepherd, whose beat took him 

 frequently over the locality to which we were going, in 

 order to learn from him the likely whereabouts of the deer. 

 The shepherd himself we found just about to start for a 

 neighbouring glen, where he had a flock of sheep to 

 visit, and his course to which lay across some of the 

 scene of our intended operations ; so, having gathered 

 from him what information we could, we gave him in 

 return strict injunctions to be careful in keeping to our 

 rear, so as not to disturb any ground we might traverse ; 

 and again we got under weigh. Our line lay up a very 

 steep and rugged brae, running off to the south at the 

 back of the shepherd's shieling, and fringed at its 

 summit by very precipitous crags. An hour or more 

 of stiff walking brought us to the foot of these rocks, 

 and we began winding up a narrow and difficult path, 

 which led out at the top to the high ground lying just 

 beyond, in which we hoped to find the deer. 



Just as we reached the very edge of the rock, one 

 of the shepherd's lads, who had attended us as gilly, 

 incautiously raised his head, without waiting till he 

 had scanned the foreground, and immediately warned 

 us that there were deer within a few yards. Gillespie, 

 inch by inch, advanced to obtain a view, but the boy's 



