154 TOUR IN SUTHERLAND. CH. X. 



pull down their stag. On most points silent and 

 reserved, on this one he is talkative and eloquent. 

 No man, too, has a greater taste for, and a more 

 correct conception of the beauties of nature : he 

 points out to you with admiration the very mountain 

 slope, the very corrie that you have already marked 

 down in your mind as surpassingly grand. At first 

 you may think him a reserved and rather morose 

 man, but when he finds out that you are not only a 

 brother of the craft, but also a fervent admirer 

 of the natural beauties of his favourite lochs 

 and corries, his heart opens, and he will go 

 through fire or water to serve you : his expression 

 of foce alters, he takes you under his protection, 

 and leads you to points of view which you would 

 have travelled fifty miles to see ; and, in fact, 

 enters into all your wishes and thoughts with tact 

 and eager desire to please you. Mercenary and 

 greedy as, I am sorry to say, Highlanders in many 

 parts of the country have become, I did not find 

 this the case in Sutherland. The shootings not 

 having been let much, the country-people are not 

 yet spoiled, but still retain in a great measure the 

 natural good feeling, the air of high-bred civility 

 of which most mountaineers have a far greater share 

 than men of the same rank of life brought up in 

 the lowlands. 



