230 EXTRACTS FROM NOTE-BOOKS. CH. XXXIV, 



the odour of which was enough to breed the plague 

 or the cholera anywhere hut in a Highland hut. 

 "Deed, your honour," said the shepherd, "it's 

 no that bad, considering M^e did not find the sheep 

 for some days after it died, and the corbies had 

 pulled it about a bit. The weather was gay an' 

 wet at the time, or.it would not have had such a 

 high flavour ; but we steeped it a day or so, to get 

 rid of the greenness of the meat." I thought to 

 myself that, " considering " all this, together with 

 the additional fact that the sheep had died of a 

 kind of inward mortification, the bowels of Donald 

 and the shepherd must be stronger even than the 

 " Dura illia messorum " which we read of at school. 



Our host was tolerably confident that we should 

 manage to get a few ptarmigan if we started early, 

 so as to make the most of the day, and if the snow 

 continued hard. " But for a' that, it will be no 

 easy travelling," was his final remark. 



Before daylight I was up, and making my toilette 

 by the light of a splinter of bog fir. The operation 

 did not take long, nor did it extend beyond the 

 most simple and necessary acts. The " gude wife" 

 had prepared me rather an elaborate breakfast of 

 porridge, tea, and certain undeniably good barley 

 and oat cakes, flanked by the remains of my supper, 

 eggs, &c. As Donald seemed not to like the expe- 



