86 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS. _{(cnar. 111 
who answered my look with a most significant kind of silent 
chuckle ; and, pointing at his knife, as if to say that we should 
soon require its services, he signed to me to move a little to the 
right hand, to get the animal free of the rock, which prevented 
my shooting at him. I rolled myself quietly a little to one side, 
and then silently cocking both barrels, rose carefully and slowly 
to one knee. I had already got his head and neck within my 
view, and in another instant would have had his shoulder. My 
finger was already on the trigger, and I was rising gradually an 
inch or two higher. The next moment he would have been 
mine, when, without apparent-cause, he suddenly moved, disap- 
pearing from our sight in an instant behind the rocks. I should 
have risen upright, and probably should have got a shot; but 
Donald’s hand was laid on my head without ceremony, holding 
me down. He whispered, “ The muckle brute has na felt us; we 
shall see him again in a moment.” We waited for a few minutes, 
almost afraid to breathe, when Donald, with a movement of im- 
patience, muttered, “ ’Deed, Sir, but I’m no understanding it,”— 
and whispered to me to goon to look over the ridge, which I 
did, expecting to see the stag feeding, or lying close below 
it. When I did look over, however, I saw the noble animal 
at a considerable distance, picking his way down the slope 
to join some half-dozen hinds who were feeding below him, 
and who occasionally raised their heads to take a good look 
at their approaching lord and master. ‘The Deil tak the brute,” 
was all that Donald said, as he took a long and far-sounding 
pinch of snuff, his invariable consolation and resource in times 
of difficulty or disappointment. When the stag had joined the 
hinds, and some ceremonies of recognition had been gone through, 
they all went quietly and steadily away, till we lost sight of 
them over the shoulder of the next hill. ‘They'll no stop till 
they get to Alt-na-cahr,” said Donald, naming a winding rushy 
burn at some distance off; ‘ Alt-na-cahr ’ meaning the ‘ Burn of 
many turns,’ as far as my knowledge of Gaelic goes. And there 
we were constrained to leave them and continue our ptarmigan- 
shooting, which we did with but little success and less spirit. Soon 
afterwards a magnificent eagle suddenly rose almost at our feet, as 
we came to the edge of a precipice, on a shelf of which, near the 
summit, he had been resting. Bang went one barrel at him, at a 
