FALDONSIDE TO DALGIG. 253 



and blackcock lead the wliite division many a hard 

 gallop ; and the smaller trials are sometimes brought 

 off on a big moss two miles away. Still, when — as 

 John Wilson alias '' Jock O'Dalgig" the trainer (and 

 a very quaint little character) expresses it — ''We 

 want to ken the Watterloo boys; ive tak them eight 

 miles doon the country, to the BuWs land at Kirk- 

 connel or Dahnellingto7i.'' The hounds have only 

 once come that way, and John almost speaks under 

 his breath to this day, when he tells how he had just 

 time to couple up his charges before they threw up, 

 scarcely three hundred yards from him, and his deep 

 thankfulness that his kennel was not eaten up bodily 

 that day. Not a man was within miles of them, and 

 when they had discovered and discussed two dead 

 calves which had been thrown into a pit, they con- 

 centrated their attention on a cade lamb, which had 

 been left in a shepherd^s plaid, and it soon departed 

 to the Happy Pastures. Cox, huntsman, had re- 

 turned to Eglinton Castle without his pack, and a 

 teleo-ram next mornin£r informed him of their where- 

 abouts, and requested his immediate presence, as no 

 one cared to go near such cannibals when they were 

 once coaxed into a stable. 



So much for the local traditions of Dalgig, where 

 Mr. Campbell was born shortly before the present 

 century. Strange to say, he cared no more for a 

 greyhound than he did for an opposum until 1849, 

 and he never attended a public meeting until what 

 racing men still fondly call " Voltigeur^s year.^^ He 



