3i6 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS chap. 



a prettier variety of game could scarcely be killed by one gun 

 in any single locality, and the whole of them were shot during 

 a few hours' walk, and on a most stormy and windy day. I 

 had promised to send a hamper of game to a friend in Edin- 

 burgh, and knowing that he would prize it more if I could make 

 up a variety than if I sent him double the quantity of any one 

 kind, 1 determined to hunt a wild part of my shooting-ground, 

 where I should have a chance of finding ducks, snipes, etc. 



I started after breakfast with a single pointer, and my ever- 

 lasting companion, an old retriever. As the steam -boat for 

 Edinburgh started the next cfey, I was obliged, though the wind 

 blew nearly a hurricane, to make the best of it, and face the 

 wind in the dreary and upland ground, which I had determined 

 to beat, and where I had sent an attendant to meet me. 



Passing over a long tract of furze and broom, I killed a 

 couple of hares, and drove some partridges off down to wind- 

 ward ; but as they flew quite out of the direction in which I 

 meant to shoot, I did not follow them. My pointer stood 

 immediately on getting into an extensive piece of grazing- 

 ground ; his head high up showed me that the birds were at 

 some distance. He drew on for some two or three hundred 

 yards, when two large coveys of partridges rose, and, unable to 

 face the wind, drifted back over my head like leaves. Bang, 

 bang — and a brace of them fell dead sixty yards behind me, 

 though shot when nearly over my head, and killed at once. I 

 marked down the rest, and got a brace more, when they went 

 straight away, as if determined to make their next resting-place 

 somewhere about Norway.' But my line was to windward still, 

 in order to hunt some ground where there was a chance (though 

 a bad one) of a brace or so of grouse. 



Picking up a snipe or two, and a hare, I worked up hill 

 against the wind along a tract of wild heather and pasture- 

 ground. In the midst of this was a small peat-bog, and, when 

 passing it, I flushed a brace of mallards, which, after drifting 

 about and trying to make their way to the sea, turned and 

 alighted in a swampy piece of ground, where there were some 

 small pools. By their manner I was sure that they had some 

 companions where they alighted, so, desiring the man who 

 accompanied me to hold the pointer, I tried to stalk unper- 

 ceived to the spot where they were, allowing my old retriever 



