12 THE RED DEER. 



Scrope writes : ' On going up to him [the stag] a 

 mark was discovered on his left ear ; the first man 

 who arrived was asked what mark it was? He 

 replied that it was the mark of Ewen-mac-Jan Og. 

 Five others gave the same answer ; and after con- 

 sulting together all agreed that Ewen-mac-Jan Og 

 had been dead 150 years, and for forty years 

 before his death had marked all the calves he 

 could catch with this particular mark ; so that this 

 deer (allowing the mark to be authentic) must 

 have been 150 years old, and might have been 180. 

 The horns, which are preserved by the present 

 Glengarry, are not particularly large, but have a 

 very wide spread.' 



Later the same writer says: 'I venture to 

 mention that, according to tradition, Captain Mac- 

 donald, of Tulloch, in Lochaber, who died in 1775 

 at the age of eighty-six, knew the white hind of 

 Lochtreig for the last fifty years of his life; his 

 father knew her an equal length of time before 

 him, and his grandfather knew her for sixty years 

 of his own time ; and she preceded his days : these 

 three gentlemen were all keen deer-stalkers. Many 

 of the Lochaber and Brae Rannoch men knew her 

 also ; she was pure white without spot or blemish.' 



A very large stag was known for two hundred 

 years in the Monalia, a range of mountains lying 

 between Badenoch and Inverness. He was always 

 seen alone, keeping the open plains, so that he was 

 unapproachable. 



Almost every history of the red deer one picks 

 up furnishes some similar 'proof of the animal's 

 capability of carrying an unlimited burden of years ; 

 but for that matter one can find corroborative 

 proof of almost any traditional belief that is 

 sufficiently widely accepted. At the same time, I 



