8 
KITE. 
A. dull and sultry morning had been followed by excessive heat, and after midday the weather gave every 
indication of an approaching storm. Shortly after one o’clock the gloom and darkness increased, and heavy 
thunder was heard rumbling among the hills both north and south of us. On leaving the bothy, we walked 
about three miles on towards the wood in which the Kites were breeding— a long straggling belt of timber 
composed entirely of Scotch fir. The nest was placed in a fork, where three limbs branched out from the main 
stem, about twenty-five or thirty feet from the ground, and was a rather larger structure than I had previously 
seen. It contained one young bird and a bad egg, and, when last visited by the keepers, the larder 
provided for the nestling consisted of a Grouse, a Duck, and a Peewit. The men had already put up a small 
shelter of fir-boughs, to screen me from the sight of the old birds, within about thirty yards of the tree ; and here 
I took up my position about half-past six, when the keepers retired to a burn about a mile distant, so as not to 
hinder the approach of the birds. I had not been waiting above half an hour when a single Kite passed over 
at a great height, evidently being aware that something was wrong. After circling two or three times over 
the nest, it took its departure, without making any attempt to come down to the young bird; and although I 
I was able to watch it by means of the glasses, I could see no signs that it carried any prey. As might 
naturally be expected, the midges gave me good cause to remember them, and before it got dark I was nearly 
driven wild by their attacks. 
“ Owing to the heavy thunder-clouds, it was so dark by a quarter to ten that I could no longer make out 
the nest; so* I left the shelter, and made the best of my way to where the men were waiting. As the country 
was strange, 1 had no little difficulty to discover the road, and, in the end, I had to fire off my gun to draw their 
attention. As we proceeded on our way homewards the storms, which had been round us all day, again drew 
near, and our track through the forest was lighted up by the flashes of lightning which followed one another 
in rapid succession. 
“ For a couple of miles our course lay through a wild and rugged glen, where the whole of the timber 
had long been dead; by far the greater number of the trees were fallen and lay rotting on the ground; 
while here and there a grim and weatherbeaten stem remained, and gave a ghastly appearance to the scene, 
its bare and twisted limbs standing out plainly defined by every flash against the inky blackness of the 
surrounding hills. On reaching the bothy shortly before eleven o’clock, as the atmosphere of the interior was 
perfectly stilling, we sat down to our supper outside the building. The flickering gleams of the sheet or 
summer lightning almost continuously illumined the smallest objects, and, although the night was dark and 
overcast, gave sufficient light for all our requirements. Hardly a drop of rain had fallen, and the air was 
close and sultry, without a breath of wind. As the heaviest of the storm was some miles distant and appeared 
to work round us instead of approach, we had ample leisure, after our hunger was appeased, to admire the 
grandeur of the scene. At times a vivid flash would strike the summit of one of the distant hills, and, 
bursting into a thousand sparks of flame, would fall, like a cascade of fire, into the valley below. Tor a second 
or two we might he enveloped in murky darkness, the hollow roll and echo of the distant thunder would die 
away for a moment, the silence being only broken by the murmurs of the water in the adjacent burn, when 
again a blaze would shoot across the heavens, and instantly mountain-side and heathery brae, the dark pine- 
forest and glassy surface of the loch, would each in turn he lighted up for a moment and again disappear from 
view. After watching the progress of the storm for at least an hour, the horses were put to; and, having 
settled to meet the keepers the next night to try for the Kites at daybreak, we started for our twenty-mile drive 
through the forest to the lodge where we were stopping. The fitful gleams of the lightning as they flashed 
through the shadows thrown by the dark and gloomy fir trees were just sufficient to guide us on our way 
and to enable the driver to avoid the hidden dangers in our course. As we emerged from the cover of the 
woods and pulled up for a few moments at a keeper’s house, the first streaks of dawn were just struggling 
through the storm-clouds, which were now rapidly disappearing. A few miles further, when the light had 
