88 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS. (CHAP. 
and in floods on the Findhorn there is seldom any dearth of food 
of this kind. Mountain sheep or wounded roe are frequently 
swept down its rapid course, when swollen with much rain or by 
the melting of snows on the higher mountains from whence this 
river derives its source. This winter, a young red deer (a calf 
of about eight months old), was found in the river. The animal 
had been shot with a slug through the shoulder, and had probably 
taken to the water (as wounded deer are in the habit of doing), 
and had been drowned and carried down the stream. 
That beautiful bird, the kite, is now very rare in this country.’ 
Occasionally I have seen one, wheeling and soaring at an im- 
mense height; but English keepers and traps have nearly extir- 
pated this bird, as no greater enemy or more destructive a foe to 
young grouse can exist. Their large and ravenous young require 
a vast quantity of food, and the old birds manage to keep their 
craving appetite well supplied. Not only young grouse and black 
game, but great numbers of young hares are carried to the nest. 
Though a bird of apparently such powerful and noble flight, the 
kite appears not to be very destructive to old grouse, but to con- 
fine her attacks to the young broods. During the season of the 
year, too, when she has no young ones to provide for, carrion of 
all kinds forms her principal food. In consequence of her greedy 
disposition, the kite is very easily trapped. From her habit of 
following the course of streams, and hunting along the shores of 
the loch in search of dead fish or drowned animals of any kind, 
one of the most successful ways of trapping the kite is to peg 
down the entrails of some animal in the shallow part of the water, 
and then to place the trap either on the shore immediately adjoin- 
ing ; or, what is often done, to form a small artificial promontory 
close to the bait, and to set the trap on this. The garbage 
catches the sharp eye,of the bird, as she soars at a great height 
above it, and the clever trapper seldom fails in catching her in 
this manner. 
The buzzard is another of the hawk tribe, which is gradually 
becoming rarer and rarer, and from the same cause. Like the 
kite, too, the buzzard is a carrion-feeding bird, and seldom kills 
anything but small birds, mice, or frogs, excepting during the 
breeding-season, when it is very destructive to game; at other 
times the buzzard lives an indolent lazy life. After having satis~ 
