To Mountain Tarn 



hide away for a while the vanishing of the old 

 strain. The case is simple. There are not even 

 two the pine and common martens as was 

 once thought, living under somewhat different 

 conditions, and with a double chance of survival. 

 There is but one species, and when it has gone 

 the end is reached. The way to perdition may 

 be one way. The pace may be slower, but it is 

 exceeding sure. 



Where is the ingenuity of the lawless but 

 interesting gentry of the midnight raid ? Is not 

 the triumph of human wit to turn to account the 

 instincts of wild creatures, just as science makes 

 use of the forces of nature ? Why does the 

 poacher not train the marten to ascend and bring 

 the quarry down from its perch on the branches ? 

 Less clumsy this than the gun with its betraying 

 crack! If it be said that they are unteachable, 

 the answer is at hand, and will be given by 

 and by. 



The marten keeps a little behind the wild cat. 

 One comes upon fresh footprints, hears some- 

 thing more definite than rumour. Scarce a mark 

 is there in the Central Grampians, or whisper of 

 its presence. For Argyllshire, it is bracketed 

 with the wild cat as "gone but within my time." 

 Its date seems to have been somewhat later, its 

 numbers dwindled more slowly. 



On the track through Sutherland, where, in 

 1848, St. John found them so to abound, the live 



39 



