162 EXTRACTS FROM HIS WORKS [ch. vii. 
golden plover, with its beautiful black breast 
margined with white stood on the top of a mossy 
mound that overlooked a bog covered with the 
“ snowy canna of the hill,” of my great-grandfather, 
old Ossian, the Eriophorum angustifolium of my 
brethren in arms, the modern botanists, these 
“ sons of little men,” or men of great souls, as you 
please; when suddenly there came upon him the 
ruthless plunderer. Loud screamed the bird of the 
moors, as he sprung on wing and sped his rapid 
flight. It was a beautiful sight to be seen. Like a 
pirate chasing a merchantman among the shoals of 
Cuba, did the merlin thread the mazes of the 
plover’s path, until at length, coming down upon 
him at an unlucky turn, he drove him to the 
ground, stunned and gasping, his right pulmonary 
vein ruptured (as you might have guessed had you 
seen the bright blood that issued from his mouth, 
for had it been the artery, as you well know, the 
blood would have been dark). There the ruthless 
marauder squeezed and pushed him with his talons 
like a burker of true breed, and scalped him as a 
Red man of “the Ohio woods” used to scalp the 
pioneers fifty years, ago, and screamed over him like 
a smocked Cossack over a murdered Frenchman in 
the Hundred Days. 
Let him divide the prey; for see how gorgeous 
the crimson of the canopy that hangs over the 
eastern waters! The plains of Lothian stretch 
towards the sea, covered with woods and corn, 
farmhouses and villages. There rises the beautiful 
