118 ORNITHOLOGICAL RAMBLES. 



completeness alone could excuse, I fired, and with a 

 bump upon the ground, he fell perpendicularly to my 

 shot. With the impression that I had unmistakably 

 disposed of him, I lowered my gun, when, to my 

 astonishment, he rose again apparently uninjured, and 

 sped away steadily and strong along the distance- 

 melting defiles of the vale. Swallowing the disappoint- 

 ment as best I could, I then as humanely as possible 

 consigned the youthful members of the family to a 

 premature decease. On the first introduction of my 

 hand, however, so virulent was the attack of two of 

 these fledglings in their defensive pounce, as literally 

 to leave their talons in my glove, completely dissevered 

 from their tender feet. Having stowed them carefully 

 in my collecting-box, and feeling exceedingly annoyed 

 at my unanticipated loss of the male bird, which, 

 without a shadow of a doubt, could not long have 

 survived the effects of the shot, and must have been at 

 this moment lying dead at some point of the vale below, 

 I made a wide detour in the direction of its flight, 

 most carefully beating every portion of the ground. 

 It, however, availed me nothing, and I wended my way 

 to Bin' Scarth steadily and without delay. 



Early on the ensuing morning which was ushered 

 in with a drizzling mist, suggesting visions of sea- trout 

 rising eagerly at the mouth of the loch I again set 

 forth, pregnant with hope, to scour a greater stretch of 

 the hill-side, and extend my peregrinations, if time 



