LETTER IV. 



59 



being hatched, and consequently the poor bird sits on them till 

 she gets so exhausted as to be incapable of flying, and so falls 

 alive into the hands of her young tormentors. A young one 

 taken from the nest becomes a useful garden scavenger, destroy- 

 ing all kinds of injurious insects. 1 



I hope to get some new eggs this season, by setting the boys 

 on the search among the moors over in Mull ; but it is not easy 

 to get the people to understand why you want eggs. St John, 

 in his Tour in Sutherland, when inquiring about an eagle's nest 

 of an old shepherd, breaks out into a lamentation upon the reserve 

 of the Highlanders, "who seem to have a suspicious dislike to giv- 

 ing information." A 

 little sneeshin, or 

 a few inches 

 of tobacco, 

 at once 

 goes to the 

 heart of the old 

 mountaineer; but it must 

 be given in the right way, 

 not as you would throw a 

 beggar a halfpenny, but 

 with such a remark as 

 "Maybe you're out 

 of tobacco to-day, , 

 Donald," or 

 "Try this, Sandy, and tell me if it's good or no." The gentle 



1 Vide Vertebrate Fauna of the Outer Hebrides, p. 70. ED. 





