FOUL WIND 369 



herd of hinds on my side of the fence, where there 

 was only a middhng stag challenging him to battle. 

 As the wounded stag was on the Attadale ground 

 I could not have fired at the unfortunate beast even 

 if I could have overtaken it. Baron Von Schroeder 

 was the lessee, and as I had never had the pleasure 

 of meeting that good sportsman, I was forced to let 

 the poor animal go and probably drag out a miserable 

 existence. 



My right of stalking extended only to Paat, Riochan, 

 and Corryeach. The foul wind blowing from the north- 

 west, from Paat to Riochan and Corryeach, was the 

 most puzzling I ever had to deal with ; blowing into 

 our faces from Paat, the moment it orot behind us on 

 to either of the other two places, it blew back again 

 into the deer we were trying to stalk. It took us 

 quite four days before we were able to make it out, 

 and the best stag I saw got a foul whiff, and I never 

 got a shot at him. This same stag was shot the next 

 season by General Crealock, but the stalking had been 

 made much easier then, as Sir K. Mathewson, the 

 Laird, had done everything in his power to make it 

 so, and had granted every expense for roads, bridges, 

 keeper's house, etc., and had the objectionable fence 

 removed, thereby allowing the herds of deer, previously 

 so troublesome when stalking, to get out. When I 

 wrote to Sir Kenneth Mathewson I hardly knew him, 

 but he followed out every suggestion I offered, and so 

 I was able to recommend one of the best stocked 

 small forests of some 14,000 acres in Scotland to my 

 friends, but none but a thorough sportsman could 

 stand the wet there. The forest ought to yield at 

 I least some forty-five stags annually, and as the Kintail 



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