88 THE MOOR AND THE LOCH. 



When I rented the grouse-shooting on Kilmun hills, it was 

 a curious but well-established fact, that if ten sheep more than 

 the ground could keep were put on, the supernumerary ten 

 were sure to die. The general rule, however, is, that they 

 grow weak and deteriorate year by year, until the farmer 

 alters his system. Any really able hill-farmer would rather 

 understock than overstock his hills. This has always been 

 my own plan, and I find my account in it. 



In former years, when there were more black cattle and 

 fewer sheep, no doubt grouse were far less disturbed and in- 

 jured by stock ; but so long as these nurseries for grouse, the 

 deer-forests, continue in such vogue, the superseding of black 

 cattle by sheep is in part atoned for. Had the grouse-grum- 

 blers complained that Highland farmers now keep more sheep 

 and fewer black cattle than they formerly did, there would 

 have been truth in the grievance. 



If it is maintained that the increasing flocks of sheep, like 

 locusts, consume the food formerly allowed to the grouse, and 

 thereby starve them out, I must own I can hardly reconcile 

 this view of the matter with the facts I am about to state : 

 1st, No one will deny that the heather on the West Highland 

 coast of Scotland is quite as good and luxuriant as that of the 

 north or centre. 2d, The average sheep-stock of the three 

 districts is pretty much upon a par that is to say, the 

 complement of sheep upon every hill is what that hill will 

 support without detriment to the stock. Now, every grouse 

 sportsman knows that the grouse in the north or centre High- 

 lands of Scotland are immensely more numerous than in the 

 watery west. To put it in another form, a crack shot in the 

 north, or in Perthshire, will sometimes bag from 150 to 200 

 brace. On our best-protected and best-managed moors in the 

 West Highlands, an equally good shot will seldom score as 

 high as fifty brace under every advantage. Now, may I ask 

 what is the reason that the birds are so much more numerous 

 in one part of the kingdom than in the other ? It is not the 



