Field Notes and Stalking Yarns 73 
communicative, but his description of the great painter’s personality was rather quaint. “ Oh 
ay, I mind him fine; he was a nice wee mannie, and he carried a braw rifle.” Sir Edwin, 
I may say, was one of the first to be armed with a breechloader. 
Mr. Grimble’s Deer-Stalking is a work which I would strongly recommend to intending 
stalkers as containing everything that the tyro should know before proceeding to the hill. 
There are plenty of other works on the subject, but none so good as this. Old stalkers, of 
course, do not require such books. After two or three seasons’ experience they know, or 
ought to know, everything that is to be learnt about the sport, and very few of them would 
ever think of looking into a text-book; but I never yet knew a stalker who was not fond of 
pictures, books, or papers that served to recall his own happy experiences on the hills of 
bonnie Scotland. 
Let me give from my diary a short account of two weeks’ stalking as typical examples of 
the ups and downs of this grand sport, remarking in advance that the state of the weather 
and the cunning way in which the deer tribe manage to avoid points of danger make it 
practically impossible at times for even the best stalkers to score. The uninitiated may 
hardly believe this, seeing that in most forests the game is so numerous, but old stalkers 
know such times well, and dread them, as the season is so short. 
The first week was one of exceptionally good luck, for I was on an outside beat, where, 
owing to the difficulties of pony service and the distance from headquarters, Black Mount 
Forest Lodge, I could not expect to kill more than one stag a day. Moreover, two days out 
of the six were occupied in tramping to and from the little iron house at Glen Kinglass. 
Tuesday , yd October. — Started at 9 a.m. with old M‘Leish for the high Snowy-corries 
beat, but the weather coming on thick, as usual, we had to remain at a lower level. Just 
below the mist, in Inverguisachan, we came on a fine light-coloured stag, moving towards us 
with twelve or fourteen hinds. The wind, however, was wrong, and he passed away above, 
giving the alarm as he did so to a much better stag, with about twenty-five hinds, that was 
lying unseen amongst some rocks at the foot of the narrow corrie. They also immediately 
headed for a pass on the opposite hill a few hundred yards above us, but we easily intercepted 
them, and I got a long shot at about 170 yards up-hill, which fortunately took the stag in 
the right place. He left the hinds at once, galloped about 100 yards down-hill, and rolled 
over dead. Weight 16 stone 2 lbs.; his head an average one of 10 points. It was then 
only 11 o’clock, and M‘Leish began to descant upon the supreme joys of fishing with a worm 
in the Kinglass ; but as I didn’t exactly hanker after that sort of thing, I proposed to go and 
look at the stags on his beat, even if he wouldn’t let me shoot another, for he said we should 
then be too far away to get a second stag home that night. After some parley a compromise 
was come to, which pleased us both, namely, that should we find a shootable stag on the 
shoulder of Ben-an-luss I might be allowed a shot, the hill being close to the lodge. And 
this is precisely what did happen. We wandered about, seeing many good beasts during the 
afternoon, and at 4 o’clock found ourselves near home and discussing the merits of four stags 
feeding quietly below us. One was an old animal, and M‘Leish, deciding that he would be 
better in the larder, I got an easy shot at about 70 yards, and killed. Weight 13 stone ; 
head of 10 points ; rather a poor one. And so home to dinner after a capital day’s sport. 
Wednesday , \th October .—Started for the big corrie with M‘Coll, and saw nothing till 
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