Chapter II: Part 2

The heather was short and stunted, with stretches of deer grass and flows; in fact, no good heather on the hill moors. Excepting on the burn banks and dry knolls, the ground was mostly peat bog, too soft to carry a pannier pony, and the birds had to be carried in panniers on gillies' backs.

The trout fishing in the upper streams and burns of the Thurso that fed Loch More was pretty good. The trout were plentiful but small, running about four to the pound, but they came quick and lively. The loch fishing was not much account; perhaps I should except one loch, that yielded heavy trout of fine quality, but very shy.

* * * * *

Glenmarkie was a Christian-like place, but the principal moors of Caithness were a howling wilderness, not a tree and scarcely a shrub; but it was a wilderness of weird beauty in changing lights. The outlook from the top of Ben Alasky on a wild stormy day, with changing sunlight and storms, over the loch bespattered land, backed up by the cliffs of Orkney, was one of the things to see and to remember.

To me this wild and weird land has great charms.

Well, I wrote to Dunbar in the early summer to say that my lease was expiring, and that I wanted a shooting for 1872, and on a long lease.

He offered me one or two small ones in the Watton and Wick districts, but I told him that I must have Glutt, Dalnawillan, or Strathmore. He replied that all were let on lease, and could not be had.

But in September he wrote again, saying that his tenant Col. C., from failing health, desired probably to relinquish the lease of Dalnawillan and Chullacan, 18,000 and 6000 acres respectively, and that they could be had jointly or separately at £400 and £160, for the unexpired term of the Colonel's lease, of which there was nine years then to run.

I sent Black down to inspect and report.

It culminated as Dunbar had foreshadowed, and at the latter end of October I went straight from Glenmarkie to Dalnawillan.

The railway was then open to Helmsdale, and from there I travelled by mail coach as far as Dunbeath, a lovely drive past Berriedale, the property of the Duke of Portland, but being night I could see but little of it on that occasion.

I slept at Dunbeath, and posted over next morning, 16 miles, the whole distance across the moorland, to Dalnawillan.

Angus Mackay, the Colonel's gillie, met me at the march with a dog, and, getting the gun out of the case, I shot up to the lodge.

The day was warm and sunny, and I was amazed and puzzled; I saw no birds. At Glenmarkie they would have rolled up over the sky line; but birds sat to the dog, and I killed three and a half brace. Three days before, at Glenmarkie, being the last day that I should shoot, I tried to get a few grouse, my endeavours resulting in one bird, but plenty of packs rising before me.

The next day was showery and gusty, and the birds did not sit well, but at Glenmarkie they would have rolled up in packs.

I spent two nights at the lodge with the Colonel's brother, who came over to meet me, and next morning was away to Thurso to meet the Colonel and Dunbar.

It was agreed that the lease should be assigned. I suggested a new lease from Dunbar, and that he should make it the full ten years.

"Take it to the end of my lease, seventeen years, if you like," says Dunbar, to which I assented; so it was settled that I should take the 24,000 acres of Dalnawillan, and Chullacan, and Backlas, at the rent of £560, proprietor paying all rates and taxes, and I paying my keeper and all other expenses.

This included a joint right of trout fishing on Dalnawillan, Strathmore, and Glutt, and salmon fishing, after June 1.

When I returned to England my shooting friends told me that I was crazy to take shooting in such an out-of-the-way, wild country, and tie myself up for such a term of years. I felt I had done right; I meant grouse shooting and fishing, and that, as railways had crept up, and were creeping up, that shootings were more likely to improve than get worse, in case of some unforeseen event occurring that should cause me to cease to shoot.

Black had made every inquiry as to disease. Dunbar told me plump that five years before they had had disease, but it was a mild attack, and did not stop shooting. As, however, the moor had not carried a good head of grouse until the year I took it, I expect that the tenants shot away, killing down the breeding stock that should have been nursed. It was admitted that the moors on the south and east had been badly hit with disease.

I took the place with my eyes open, and was prepared to take the fat with the lean, but I candidly confess that I had more lean than I expected or liked.

I looked for disease in 1874, but it came sooner.

SEASON 1872.

Of course, the moor was larger than I needed for my own personal use, and according to the fashion of the time I proposed to get others to join me, so I looked out for a couple of guns to share expenses.

It was proposed that the moor should be shot in three parties of one gun each. There was no difficulty in those days in getting guns to join, but it is very difficult now. I take it, that before the passing of the Ground Game Act there was more English shooting of a moderate character, and, so to speak, men were educated to shoot, and naturally were desirous of trying their hands on grouse; besides, the shooting squires are not so well to do throughout the country as they were before the depression in land.

I advertised in the _Field_ on a Saturday, and before Monday was over a gentleman in Berkshire had been straight to my place in Shropshire and arranged for one gun, and the other was fixed before the end of the week. Very nice, cheery, gentlemenly men they both were. Mr. C. and Mr. D. were my colleagues.

My wife, my sister-in-law, and the children, accompanied us in August; we had a sleeping saloon as far as Helmsdale, the then terminus of Northern Railways.

That night we stopped at Ross's Hotel. Helmsdale was the only entrance by road into Caithness, and Ross's the only hotel, so the capacity of Ross's rooms was the gauge of the traffic. The Countess of Caithness had our rooms the night before, and they were booked for somebody else the night after us.

The next day Ross posted us in a _char-a-banc_ the thirty-two miles to Dalnawillan, stopping to lunch and bait horses at Dunbeath; the luggage had gone on before in two carts.

The drive to Dunbeath was lovely over the Ord and past Berriedale, the Duke of Portland's place.

At Dunbeath after lunch the party walked down to the sea to look at the rocks and fishing boats, and we all enjoyed it thoroughly; after this break there was a sixteen mile drive across the moorland, passing Braemore and Glutt Lodges on the left.

There being no railway we made arrangements with the Glutt party, and engaged with a carrier to bring letters, supplies, &c., from Dunbeath and take back game bags, empties, &c., the following day. We were quite as well off, in fact, better than if we had been fidgetted with railway, post-office, and telegraph at our elbow.

Things went well with us, the shooting was excellent, the Chullacan and Backlas beats were especially full of birds that season. At Chullacan was a very primitive farmhouse with a small cooking place, and a room for us to serve as sitting-room and bedroom. The farmer's room was at the other end of the house, and in his case the smoke found its way through the hole in the roof. At this place we lodged twice for two nights, each time when we shot the beats on that side. We were pretty cramped, making up three small beds at night; the morning bath we took by standing outside the house in a state of nature while the gillies douched us with pails of cold spring water.

The first time that we went over on the three days shooting, I made forty-two, forty, and forty-five brace to my own shoulder, and on our return we enjoyed the comfort of a day's lazy rest amongst the comforts of Dalnawillan Lodge. We were all very happy, my two chums in raptures, and insisting on engaging their guns for the next season.

Man proposes, God disposes.

Bag. Dalnawillan and Rumsdale.

Grouse 1098 brace.
Sundries 67-1/2 "

The birds were healthy in a way when we left, but did not look well in plumage. It had been a wet draggly summer, and that partly accounted for it; but before leaving we saw a few very seedy birds on our Dunbeath march.

Dunbar had been very busy all the season for the Duke of Sutherland.

At that time the shootings and fishings of the Helmsdale Strath were divided into three great lumps of ground:

Sir John Karslake the upper end, say about 60,000 acres.
Mr. Hadwen, the middle, say about 60,000 "
Mr. Meredith, the bottom end, say about 60,000 "

I cannot be precise about the extent, but that was about it.

Mr. Akroyd's, in Strath Naver, was almost unlimited, and included nearly all the salmon fishing of the Naver.

The Duke was disturbed in his mind, or somebody else was, and, Dunbar being the only man who really knew anything about the management of shootings and fishings, the Duke sent for him and engaged his services to report on the whole matter of the Sutherland shootings and fishings for the handsome fee of £1000, and well earned too, as he was the only man that could do it.

Acting under his advice the Duke divided the Helmsdale Strath into six shootings, with six salmon rods on the river, one rod to each shooting at £50 for those who chose to take them, and so the thing remains to this day, but with rents increased and half the ground taken away, the then existing tenants were somewhat indignant, but there was nothing much to grumble about.

Mr. Hadwen, who lived upon his place, being very little away, and also farmed the sheep, had built himself a good house on a yearly tenancy, went to see the Duke and the factor, Mr. Peacock, and they had a meeting about it.

"Your grace, I have been your tenant now for nearly twenty years, never dreaming that I should be disturbed in any way! you now take away half the shooting and increase the rent, and that after I have spent 2000_l._ in building a good house on your land."

"Is that so, Peacock?" says the Duke.

"Yes, your grace, it is so."

"Then pay him for his house, and then we start fair," says the Duke.

SEASON 1873.

The accounts in the early spring were very cheering. On the 1st of April Black wrote to congratulate us on excellent prospects, not a bad bird had he seen since we left in September. There was a grand breeding stock, and he anticipated splendid shooting.

But it was not to be. On the 15th he writes reporting birds looking badly diseased, and on the 30th writes again that a third of the birds were dead.

It was sickening news, but there was hope yet, as a fair breeding stock was left, and the disease appeared to have spent itself, the birds nesting fairly well.

At the beginning of July disease again broke out, and with greater virulence, young and old birds falling before it; but David begged us to come, of course, in August and shoot down all we could, and so sweeten the ground for those that remained by stamping out all that was possible.

Disease prevailed over nearly all Scotland; amongst others, Glenmarkie was very bad. We did not put any birds on the table, and I sent none to my friends. What few good-looking birds there were went to London, and the scarcity through the country may be imagined when I say that they made 19_s._ a brace.

Bag. Dalnawillan and Rumsdale.

Grouse 151 brace.
Sundries 24 "

My chums were pretty miserable, and so was I. It was a bitter disappointment. No word from D. as to taking a gun for the next season, and in about a week or ten days they both went south. However, I had to make the best of it, and, leaving my family at Dalnawillan, I went into Sutherlandshire trout fishing for a fortnight with my son Douglas, and after that we all went home.

Caithness, in those days, was the worst mapped county in Great Britain. There was a good estate map of the Ulbster estates, and the maps were pretty reliable for a few miles from the coast. Sutherland, belonging mainly to one proprietor, was well mapped.

On Dalnawillan we had a loch--a long walk across very bad ground from the lodge--that held, both in size and quality, the best trout in Sutherland and Caithness, but not plentiful; the best I ever did was eighteen fish in a day, but eight of them weighed 9-1/4lb., the largest being 1-3/4lb., and that was the largest size they ever reached, and, generally, a day's fishing meant eight or ten, with the half of them the larger size. A predecessor of mine at Dalnawillan assured me that many were got up to 3lb. and 4lb.; it is marvellous the falsehoods men will commit themselves to as to size of fish--men perfectly reliable in other ways.

The gillies talked a good deal about a loch in Sutherland, not far off our march, where the fish were nearly as large and good, and very free to rise. That sounded very nice, and needed to be experimented, and my son Douglas and I said we would take it on our way into Sutherlandshire.

In those days the lochs of Sutherlandshire were free to the angler, and for some years the Duke made it a condition in letting shootings that it should be so, and as the bulk of the lochs were difficult of access, and anglers few, there was no friction; and in the summer months there were generally two or three rod men stopping at Auchentoul Inn, on the Helmsdale Strath.

In the old Scotch fashion, the inn was part inn and part shooting lodge, and in this case Sir John Karslake's keeper kept the inn, so everything was well regulated, and caused no annoyance to Sir John or his deer. Sir John was always courteous and pleasant.

Auchentoul Inn was twelve miles cross country--and very cross country--from Dalnawillan, and we sent our portmanteau to Dunbeath, sixteen miles, thence by coach, sixteen miles, to Helmsdale, and there to wait a chance lift up the Strath, eighteen miles, to Auchentoul.

We also ordered a machine from Auchentoul to meet us at Forsinean, ten miles by a decent road.

Willie Hunter, one of our gillies, vouchsafed to pilot; he had herded sheep at this Loch Sletil, and knew all about it. The ordnance maps now tell us that it is seven and a half miles from Dalnawillan, across a very bad piece of moorland and flow.

We left Dalnawillan at 8.30 a.m.--that is, David, Douglas, and I, and Hunter as pilot; a nasty, wet, drizzling rain; encased in macintoshes, wet outside with rain and inside with perspiration, and after two and a half hours tramping and slushing over the wet moors, Willie pulled up, and in a very confused manner stated that we ought to be at the loch; "anyhow, it used to be here," said Willie.

A council was held to determine the present location of this wandering loch, and a deviation of half a mile to the right put us upon it. Willie returned.

After a rest we donned wading stockings, and put rods together; it would be 12 o'clock by the time we began; we had some nice fish, largest 1lb., but our wading stockings would not put us into sufficiently deep water for the larger fish; but we saw enough to convince us that the loch was not overstated.

We fished away, and packed up about 6 p.m. to make our way across the moor to Forsinean.

Again we missed our way; we took the shoulder of Ben Sletil too high up, and it was getting dark when we struck the road, as it turned out, a mile on the Auchentoul side of Forsinean. Of course no machine.

It was raining; it had rained the whole day, and looked as if it meant to rain for a week, and we took off our macintoshes to lighten the walk--we could not get much wetter. Presently we met a shepherd, who told us Forsinean and the trap were behind us, and, telling him to send the trap after us, we tramped the hard road the whole nine miles, arriving at the same time as the trap that followed.

Our portmanteau did not arrive till next morning, but the innkeeper found us dry flannels and a good supper; it was then 10 o'clock.

* * * * *

C. was very hopeful that grouse matters would quickly mend, and stuck to it for another season, and after that I was left with the whole cost of the affair for the following season, and seasons after that, which, with rent, keeper, and expenses, was not less than £700 a year, and nothing to shoot either, which was the worst part of the business.

SEASON 1874.

Neither C. nor I went near the place. Disease was gone, and so were the birds. It could have been truthfully advertised as perfectly free from disease, and lightly shot the previous season. In May, before nesting time, David hunted every beat, and found just fifty-two pairs of birds on the whole 24,000 acres.

In August he again hunted, and came across exactly the same number of broods as he had found pairs. They certainly were grand broods, averaging eight to a brood, and he managed to kill out nearly all the old cock birds, leaving but one old bird to each brood.

Dunbar was very unhappy, and, of course, I was the same, and we arranged to have a consultation, and I met him in Edinburgh, where he had occasion to be. Dunbar summed up the whole thing by saying, in his plump way, there must be no birds whatever killed for two years at least.

Glutt, in some way, was, fortunately, off Dunbar's shoulders, and on the hands of the proprietor, who had it in hand for three years afterwards, when Dunbar took it off his hands at a moderate rent.

Strathmore was still on lease, the lease expiring after the season of 1874, and, backing his opinion that no birds should be killed in 1874, he arranged with the tenants that, in consideration of no grouse being taken off, he would abate half the year's rent.

He asked me if I would take Strathmore off his hands for the remaining fourteen years of his lease. "You shall have the whole 19,000 acres, including Achlybster, for £350 a year." But I was not a jobber in moors, and already had more than enough on my hands; but, if I had been clear of Dalnawillan, I think I would have closed with him.

The railway was making, and as the Rumsdale beats are too far away from Dalnawillan Lodge to shoot them conveniently from there, Dunbar suggested that I should build a small lodge near to the proposed station, and let off 10,000 acres of the Rumsdale side of Dalnawillan so soon as the stock of birds would warrant it.

That idea suited me down to the ground, as the remaining 13,000 or 14,000 acres attached to Dalnawillan was ample for the personal shooting of myself and sons, with, perhaps, a friend; the idea was eventually carried out at the proper time.

* * * * *

In July Douglas and I went to Rhiconich, on the west coast of Sutherland, for a fortnight's sea trout fishing. It was a disappointment; firstly, it was dry hot weather, that, of course, stopped sea trout fishing.

In the evening the midges were something unbearable, and drove us on to the sea loch trolling for lythe. We were pretty successful, but very soon used up everything in the shape of phantoms and spinners, and had to take to small trout for spinning.

So soon as a lythe of any size took your spinner, down he went into the seaweed tangle, and many were lost and the spinner with him.

We managed to get twenty-one lythe, weighing 83lb., of which some were up to 10lb., but we lost most of the best fish in the weeds.

On our way back we stopped at Overscaig, on Loch Shin, for a day's trout fishing, ending in a very fatiguing fiasco; we had a boat and two rowers, David and a gillie from the inn.

The morning was a nice fishing morning, and we made our way down to the Faig mouth, and got on pretty well, but, the wind changing, we put across to the other shore, and fished away.

As the day wore on, the wind increased, blowing a gale straight down the loch, so we got out of the boat, and, with a good deal of trouble, hugging the shore, the two men managed to get her back to just opposite Overscaig.

There we found two other men, who had come up from Lairg, and were in the same fix as ourselves.

It was raining heavily as well as blowing.

Taking advantage of a lull of wind, we tried to get across, but when a third way across, the wind again rose, and we had our work to do to edge the boat head to wind to gain the shore without an accident.

What was to be done? asked the other party. I said that I saw nothing for it but to walk round the head of the loch. They consulted with their boatman as to this, and then said they could not do it. Certainly, they had come out with thin boots and frock coats and white shirts, as they would have done on a fine afternoon at Richmond, totally unfit to face a wild Highland night.

"We have had no dinner," says one; "of course, we expected to get to Overscaig to dinner." "Well," I said, "we have a little of our lunch left, and you are welcome;" but they turned away. I believe they thought I was chaffing them.

However, there was the choice of stopping out on the moor that wild night or footing it, and we chose what we thought the lesser of two evils.

It was a very long three miles to head the loch and the swamp at the top. The shore of the loch was very deep peaty boggy ground, broken every fifty yards with deep gullies and burns and drains, clambering down and clambering up.

It was then quite dark, a howling wind and rain in our teeth.

At last, with nearly two hours' work, we crossed the Alt Na Ba Burn, and, heading the swamp, got to the river that connects Loch Graim with Loch Shin.

But, horror! the river was in spate, and not safe to cross.

We felt dead beat, and sat down in the wet; we had a little whiskey and water, but nobody said anything; one tried to light a pipe, but the matches were wet, and so was everything else outside our skins. We tried to look at our watches, but too dark to see them.

It was getting towards midnight. We started again, keeping along the banks of the river, to look for a ford. Near the outlet of Loch Graim the river was wider, and therefore the stream not so strong, and the bottom was hard. I had a long landing-net staff, and piloted the way; the water was up to the bottom of the waistcoat--an even depth, and gravel bottom, so we were all quickly safe across. Folks will say what a fuss about crossing up to your middle; yes, but handicap it with a dark howling night, an unknown ford, and all your courage already pretty nearly pumped out of you, and it will not be found to be quite so simple as it looks.

There was yet a mile of swampy walking over moorland, in the direction of the road, before it was struck, but then we were not more than two and a half miles from the inn, and soon put that behind us.

It was 1.30 a.m. when we reached the inn; they were waiting up most anxiously, fearing some serious accident, but could hardly credit that we had headed the loch, and on such a fearful night.

I have had many long wet moorland tramps, but nothing approaching to our Loch Shin episode.

I told David to see that our gillie had a good tea and eating, and some hot whiskey and water, but he came back to say the fellow was so thoroughly beat that he had gone to bed, too tired and done up to eat or drink anything.

SEASON 1875.

In June I went to Dalnawillan trout fishing.

The Thurso river rises in the heights of the Glutt shootings on the Sutherland march amongst a bewildering labyrinth of flows and black morasses, hideous, and gaunt. I have seen the inside of most Scotch wildernesses, but there is nothing anywhere within the four seas--aye, take in Ireland as well--that at all approaches the plateau from which descend the Berriedale, the Halladale, the Thurso, and the northern water shed of the Helmsdale, at a height of about 1400ft. above the sea.

The Thurso, commencing and for many miles a mere burn, descends from the heights through low flats, interspersed with three rocky gorges or glutts (from which, no doubt, the name of the shooting), of from half a mile to a mile each in length, the burn tumbling through them in a succession of small falls and rocky pools; and in the lowest gorge was a waterfall or force, as it would be termed in Yorkshire or Westmoreland.

One day fly fishing up the river, as far up as the entrance to the first gorge, I tried some of the rocky pools. They were quite unsuitable for the fly, but I took a number of pretty, little, bright trout.

Talking it over with the gillies next day, they said there was no remembrance of anybody ever having taken any fish with rod and line, or any other way, up in the rocky water.

Well, I bethought myself, as I felt sure there would be fish as far up as there was water, and that something might be done with the worm worth talking about in a small way.

I was an adept in that style of fishing, having had much experience and success in fishing small wooded brooks in Warwickshire. My mode of fishing was with a three-jointed light stiff bamboo rod, bored down the middle; the line, a very thin one, passing through and out at a hole near where the hand holds the bottom joint.

When too long take off the bottom joint; no reel, simply a few yards of line running loose behind, the hook whipped to one or two feet of gut, and one No. 6 shot about six inches above the hook, having no rings, no line bagging, you could push in the point of the rod anywhere, and drop the worm by shaking the rod.

A large bag of small worms was provided, and the tackle Stewart fashion, but with two small hooks only, and pretty fine gut.

David and I started away, and were at the foot of the lower gorge by 10 a.m., David behind me; and soon the fun was fast and furious, every little fall and the pool below it, the worm no sooner in the bubbles and froth than tug, tug, tug. "Lift him out, unhook him David and bait again; no, the worm will do." Tug again; "Unhook him and bait this time." Tug again. "Well, three out of that little hole is not so bad!"

David was disgusted at messing with such trash, as he termed it, but soon even he warmed to it.

The waterfall had a nice pool scooped out by the falling water, and, standing down stream below the fall, thirty came out of that place.

It was great fun to come across water and fish in these islands that were totally unsophisticated.

We worked up and up for miles, until the burn--aye, and the fish too--began to get very small, and at five o'clock we turned back, fishing a few of the best places on our way. The waterfall gave but two more, and I expect that was the last two in the pool.

Weighed at the lodge, deducting the basket, they scaled just 23-1/2lb., and counted out 188 trout, just eight to the pound, and pretty little bright fellows they were.

David looked at them deprecatingly; repentance at being a party to anything so derogatory had come over him, and he viewed them philosophically, with the sole remark, "What a mess!"

My fishing was in low water. My son Douglas went up a few days after, meeting a rise of water, and he also had a great number, but out of places that I had not fished in low water.

The waterfall yielded none.

The burn was tried again on another day, but it was done for a season or two; as in other things in the world, you can't eat a cake and have it.

In August I took down my family party for their holidays. There would be little or nothing to shoot, a few cock birds to pick out of the broods and some sundries, of course. The boys could fish away for trout and get a few odd salmon out of the Upper Thurso and Loch More, but they were very coppery and red at that season.

During the first fortnight David and I hunted the whole of the ground, killing the old cocks out of the broods when opportunity occurred.

The increase of birds was very satisfactory, quite 150 broods on the ground, and fine broods too.

Bag. Dalnawillan and Rumsdale.

Grouse 38-1/2 brace.
Sundries 57-1/2 brace.

Dunbar had been very fortunate, and let Strathmore to an old connection; rather more birds had been left by the scourge on the lower beats of Strathmore than on Dalnawillan. Those beats are the best ground in Caithness, and if there are any birds there they naturally will be. Dunbar looked the matter well in the face, told the tale, the whole tale, and let it on a seven years' lease, commencing, if I remember right, with a rent of £300, increasing up to £575, or thereabouts.

The gentleman who took it knew exactly what he was about. The good years that would accrue after disease were before him.

The year after the expiration of the seven-year lease and cycle, disease was again ravaging, and there was little or no shooting for two or three years after that.

The new tenant nursed the birds the first season, killing only a few cocks or so.

In September, with one of the boys, I went over to Orkney, to try the fishing of the Loch of Stennes. We landed from the tub of a steamer that plied between Scrabster and Stromness, after a terribly bad passage across the Pentland Firth. The tide ran very strong, the wind met it, and the steamer, built on the lines of a walnut shell, rolled about in the trough of the sea.

We landed, and hiring a cart to carry our traps, tramped away to the top of the loch in Harray parish, and lodged with Peter Flett, farmer and miller.

The trout were most beautiful, equal to any sea trout, but not plentiful, anyhow very stiff to rise; they ran all sizes. Our best day to two rods was 17-1/2lb., the largest scaling 2lb. 6oz.

On one other day we had fish of 1lb. 4oz. and 1lb., and amongst our take were some half-pound sea trout.

The loch was terribly ottered by the small farmers and crofters, but with very coarse horse-hair tackle. Certainly they did not get many; but, no doubt, that put them down from rising to the fly.

The ottering was not poaching, because every freeholder had the right, and nearly all were freeholders.

I asked Flett where he got his land from. "My father," said he; "and he had it from his father, and his father before him." I dare say if Peter and I could have traced it we should have found that the title commenced with his Scandinavian ancestors, who stole the land from the Pict, who lived in an underground house designed after the pattern of an improved fox-earth.

"What is done with the younger sons, Flett?"

"Oh, they go to the fishing, or into the Hudson Bay Co.'s employment." That was primogeniture with a vengeance. I wonder what the land reformers would have to say to that.

"Flett, what deeds have you to show?"--"Deeds! what do we want with deeds?"--"Well, suppose you want to mortgage."--"Orkney people don't mortgage," says Flett, with his nose in the air.

In a few days we had enough.

We loaded our traps on Peter's cart, and returned to Stromness, looking at an underground Pict's house on the way, where perhaps Flett's ancestor had disposed of the aborigines, by smoking them, and stopping up the outlets, as you would stifle rats.

Also we saw the Stones of Stennis, which, as Druidical remains, rank with Stonehenge.

We stopped on our way at the bridge that crosses the outlet of the loch to the sea, to try for sea trout. The tide water comes up to the bridge, and a little beyond, and from the bridge to the sea was about a mile.

On the rise and fall of the tide we landed six sea trout weighing 6-1/2lb., the largest 2-3/4lb.

On the fall of the tide the sea trout stopped taking, and then the sillocks came as fast as possible. We had seventy-nine of them in little over an hour.

I was very much pleased with Orkney. The land was good, and the climate was better than that of the mainland.

There were some grouse, and, as far as I could learn, the best moor was in Harray parish, where we had been fishing.

The moor was a common, and the whole of the commoners joined in granting a lease to the tenant of the shooting. I think the rent was £35 a-year, and he took off about 200 brace of grouse, and a really considerable number of snipe and plover, and I believe it was true that there was no disease. The game sold for more than paid the rent.

SEASON 1876.

Pretty much a repetition of the previous season; grouse were increasing fast, but none to spare for the gun.

I worked away at the cock birds, and let the boys get their hands in on the outside beats, where the birds would not be missed, breaking them in work as well as the dogs.

In the spring of this year, carrying out the idea propounded by Dunbar, utilising my experience of American house building in wood, of which I had taken careful particulars when in that country a year or two previously, I built a small lodge near to Altnabreac station, containing kitchen, parlour, and five bedrooms, and let it, with 12,000 acres of moorland, for three years--first year £200, second and third year at £300 a year, including keeper, with a proviso that if my keeper was of opinion that the birds could not be spared the bag should be limited to 100 brace in the first year, and in that event I was to return £100 of the rent.

I did limit them, and sent them a check for £100.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 112 brace. 100 brace.
Sundries 54-1/2 " ----

The railway was open and a station stuck down in the middle of the moorland four miles from Dalnawillan Lodge and seven from Glutt, no road, or footpath even, in any direction from the station.

It was stuck down in the centre of the moorland to take its chance.

For the use of Dalnawillan and Glutt Dunbar and I did our best to induce the proprietor to make the four miles of road that was needed.

We offered during the tenancy of our leases to pay the proprietor six per cent. on the £600, which was the estimated cost of the road, and do the repairs ourselves, but of no avail. At last it was settled that I should make the road and find the money, the cost, with interest at five per cent., to be repaid to me by twelve equal yearly instalments, of which the proprietor contributed half, Dunbar a quarter, and myself a quarter. The road was made and open ready for use for the shooting season of 1876.

* * * * *

After about a fortnight at Dalnawillan I took a trip into Shetland with my boy Charlie, to verify the wondrous tales of sea trout that were to be had in every tidal stream and loch.

It was a miserable disappointment, every fish that could be had was poached on the spawning beds and by any other means at any other time; but on some of the outer islands, I believe, matters were better.

What there were were very fine fish; we had nine in all, four of which weighed 6-1/2lb.

What a small world it is! Charley was fishing away in Brouster Loch in waders up to his middle, when someone calls out: "Holloa, Charley, what are you doing here?" And there was his class master at Clifton College also up to his middle.

On our return to Caithness we had a horribly stormy passage from Lerwick to Wick, putting in for the night at Kirkwall in Orkney, to shelter from stress of weather.

Lerwick is a very pretty little town, the most northerly in Great Britain, doing a good and lively trade in fishing matters, and having a great many visitors in the season. For those cockneys who have the blessed faculty of defying _mal de mer_, and enjoying bottled porter and a pipe with the ocean in commotion--and my experience, so far as it goes, is that in those northern latitudes it always is in commotion--what can be a pleasanter or a cheaper sea trip than to go by the Aberdeen boat from London Bridge to Aberdeen, and thence to Lerwick _viâ_ Wick, and round the islands in the trading steamer, and home by the West Coast.

Shetland from the outside looks very nice. It is indented in every direction with fiords, or voes they call them there, with very fine cliff scenery.

But the inside is dismal, the crofters and fishermen pare the turf and heather for winter bedding for their cattle, and, what with that and peat cutting for fuel, they leave the surface of the hills very black looking and hideous.

* * * * *

There is some good heather, perhaps about seven thousand acres, in the main island, and it would, no doubt, carry some grouse, if any means could be devised for destroying the swarms of greyback gulls, hoodie crows, and hawks.

Not a living thing can show, without being pounced upon and devoured. The only game of any description that I saw was two snipe; not even a rabbit.

Before I went it had struck me as an anomaly that there should not be grouse, and I looked well into the question of whether grouse could be profitably introduced, but, looking at the small amount of moorland, and the large cost, if not impossibility of destroying the vermin, I gave up the notion. I notice from letters in the _Field_ and elsewhere that others are agitating the question, and they will do well to thoroughly bottom the question before incurring heavy responsibilities.

One thing that strikes a visitor is the incessant knitting on the part of every woman and girl; no matter when or where, the knitting needles incessantly ply. Carrying baskets of peats from the hills in creels on their backs, still the needles ply in front.

Some of their knitting is very beautiful. The common goods are knitted from imported yarn, but the beautiful shawls are knitted from yarn spun from the fully-grown wool of the indigenous native sheep.

The wool is not clipped, but pulled when fully ripe.

The native sheep are of all colours, white, brown, yellow, &c., and many piebald.

With these colours the varied colours of the best quality Shetland shawls are derived from the natural colour of the wool, without dyeing.

Some of the shawls are exquisitely fine, and fetch large prices. For one, many yards square, I gave £5. Of course it was a unique specimen, and afterwards, in England, I was assured that it was a cheap purchase. It could be doubled up not much larger than a pocket handkerchief.

SEASON 1877.

At last a gleam of sunshine. Seasons 1873, '74, '75, and '76, four long years practically blank, and heavy expenses running the while; it was a heartbreaking business, worse than my experience in Banffshire. But at last I was to expect some moderate shooting for two guns, and my expectations were realised.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 426-1/2 brace. 300 brace.
Sundries 85-1/2 " ----

SEASON 1878.

This was to be really good shooting for two guns.

My son Oliver was to be home from New York for a holiday, and I reserved the shooting for him and myself, and very pleasant shooting we had. We shot together--

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 627-1/2 brace. 480 brace.
Sundries 64-1/2 " ----

SEASON 1879.

This was the eighth year that I had paid rental for this moor, and this was the second year out of the eight that it would afford shooting for more than two guns.

I had a very fine stock of birds upon the ground. I had nursed the stock judiciously. I had not shot it down when recovering from disease, and at last the moor was full of birds, and for the next two or three years, until the scourge paid its next visit, we might shoot and hammer away at the birds, without detriment. Nothing that we could do in the way of shooting could possibly reduce the breeding stock below what it should be, until disease again reduced it.

I had relet the Rumsdale side, with 10,500 acres, for three years, at £300 per annum, leaving, say 13,500 acres to Dalnawillan shooting.

We laid ourselves out for a fine bag, and we had it.

I said to David, "Last season, shooting with Mr. Oliver, we made together over six hundred brace. Now, we have treble the birds we had to begin that season. If I go to work shooting steadily by myself, say seven hours a day for four days a week, can I take off 600 brace to my own gun and for once make a swagger bag?"--"Yes, you can," says David.--"Then I will do it," responded I; so it was arranged to shoot the moor in two parties, myself one party, and two guns in the other party; each party taking the beats fairly in turn.

The second party of two guns was made up of the three elder boys and a friend, shooting five days a week, weather permitting, taking their turns alternately, the men out, going after snipe and ducks and fishing.

I started with 42 brace on the 12th, and on the 14th 52-1/2 brace, and continued to make good bags. On August 26, my fifty-eighth birthday, I came in with 50-1/2 brace; it was the second time over the beat, and on September 15, in twenty-one days shooting, I numbered 617 brace, close upon an average of 30 brace a day besides sundries.

Generally through Scotland moors had not fairly recovered their full complement of birds, and I believe it was acknowledged that 617 brace was the best bag in Scotland made that season to one gun in the first five weeks shooting over dogs.

We had a fine time and a very enjoyable time, and up to the 16th of September, when we went south, we had taken off 1138 brace.

In October I returned with two other men to shoot under the kite, and we took off just 200 brace. When at Glenmarkie, I could do nothing with the kite, the birds rolled up before it and away for a couple of miles.

October shooting in Caithness and Sutherland over dogs under the kite when birds are plentiful, is very grand sport. It is the acme of point shooting.

In October the air is crisp and bracing, there is plenty of walking, and you are in the best condition, or you ought to be.

The kite is a large kite, much larger than the partridge kite used in England, and is flown very high, and so covers a large extent of ground. It is worked down wind in front of the gun, so the dog has to work down wind and on ticklish birds; therefore I need not say that it requires clever old experienced dogs. Many good August dogs cannot get into it.

Packs of six to twelve birds rarely sit well; they rise at sixty to one hundred yards, but the small lots and single birds sit fairly well, rising at twenty to thirty yards.

They rise in front like a wisp of lightning, hardly well up before they turn to the right or left and away behind you. They should be taken just on the turn. It is very difficult to get in a second barrel unless, as they turn and go past they are near enough for a skimming side shot.

* * * * *

Good driving shots have said to me that the man who can walk and kill October grouse under the kite, and kill them well, can kill anything.

October sport with the kite is very uncertain. There may be too much wind or too little, and in that month you sometimes get very bad weather and more snow than is pleasant, and then of course birds are very wild and unsettled.

Big bags cannot be made under the kite; an average of 15 brace per day to a gun is very good. I never managed to make 20 brace; twice I have made 19-1/2, and could generally average 15.

There is an impression that the kite puts birds off the ground, and generally makes them wild; but I don't think so. Of course the beats are changed, and my impression is that it has no more effect than an eagle hovering and then going on.

Those who have kited and driven, tell me that driving disturbs and unsettles the birds far more than the kite.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 1338 brace. 900 brace.
Sundries 155-1/2 " ----

A number of grouse were, in addition, killed by the keeper during the winter months.

The total to my own bag was 674 brace of grouse, and 48-1/2 brace of sundries.

SEASON 1880.

Another grand season, the best out of the seventeen years of the lease.

On the first and second days I shot by myself, taking off fifty-four and forty-four and a half brace respectively. I was in very good form, and began by getting sixteen brace without slipping a cartridge.

After the first two days we shot in two parties of two guns each. Up to September 16, when we went south, we had 1284-1/2 brace.

In October I returned, with another man, to shoot under the kite, and we made 188-1/2 brace.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 1473 brace. 1600 brace.
Sundries 128-1/2 " ----

The sundries included ninety-seven snipe, the greatest number ever made in one season.

The Rumsdale party shot very hard almost every day to end of season.

A number of grouse were in addition killed by my keeper during the winter.

SEASON 1881.

Grouse had culminated to their highest level, the highest ever known in the record of the Dalnawillan moors, and were now to recede, and again undergo the scourge.

In the spring, birds were looking well, and in great plenty.

We could not say that there was disease amongst them, in fact, we could have conscientiously said that we had not seen a diseased bird. But, later on, we saw barren birds, nests not so well filled as they should be; and in August, many birds shabbily feathered on the legs, and thin breasted.

There was nothing like the quantity of birds as in the previous August, bad nesting would account for that. Some broods would, perhaps, jump up, with one or two miserable chirpers in addition to one old bird, and barren birds also were plentiful.

The moor was shot in two parties of two guns each, and afforded fair sport.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 822 brace. 900 brace.
Sundries 73-1/2 " ----

We did not return in October, as the prospects were not sufficiently encouraging.

SEASON 1882.

I was anxious about the birds, in fact, in my own mind it was a foregone conclusion. But Black wrote in the spring to say that there was a fair stock upon the ground, and looking pretty well, though now and again seeing a bad bird, and he was inclined to think that disease was to pass over with the brush of the previous year; but disease was due, and I had my misgivings that history would repeat itself.

Nothing very particular occurred during the nesting season, and in August we went down, expecting some fair shooting, but it was not so; it was a great disappointment. With all our experience and careful watching of the state of the birds, they had died off--imperceptibly dwindled away since the spring.

Disease in this attack was very different in its aspect from former attacks. They come on very suddenly, sharp and decisive; but on this occasion I have no doubt but that it had been hanging about all through 1881, and also in the spring and summer of 1882, steadily wearing away the birds bit by bit.

There was little to shoot, and I agreed with my neighbours that we should all spare our birds, and nurse what were left. My tenant at Rumsdale would not hold his hand, and shot away, to my serious detriment, as it was the last year of his lease.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 186 brace. 300 brace.
Sundries 94 " ----

SEASON 1883.

Disease had worn itself through in the season of 1882, and birds were clean, but very scarce, in the spring of 1883, and needed careful nursing, so I went down for a few days, hunting the ground, and found a sprinkling of birds on Dalnawillan, and next to none on Rumsdale.

I killed all the cocks I could, and Black followed them up after I left.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 53 brace. ----
Sundries 54 brace. ----

SEASON 1884.

Dalnawillan, carefully considering the matter, could spare a few birds; what breeding stock there was has done well, but there were not enough birds to make it worth while to take down a party, so I let the place for the season to two gentlemen, with a limit of 300 brace, of course, at a small rent.

The attraction was the fishing and a pleasant lodge and surroundings for their holiday.

By myself I went down for a fortnight to shoot on the Rumsdale ground, to take off just what I thought could be spared.

I found pretty well of birds on the beats adjoining Dalnawillan, and took off 170-1/2 brace.

A fair, but moderate, breeding stock was left on both moors.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 300 brace. 170-1/2 brace.
Sundries 97-1/2 brace. 16 brace.

SEASON 1885.

Very pleasant shooting, bags not large, but enough to keep going; game good and healthy.

I let Rumsdale to a gentleman, who shot by himself his own gun only.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 635-1/2 brace. 439 brace.
Sundries 94 brace. ----

SEASON 1886.

A very good season, both on Dalnawillan and Rumsdale. Shooting up to Sept. 13th in two parties: of two guns each gave 1006-1/2 brace, and in October a further bag of 205 brace to three guns; a most charming fortnight's shooting.

Bag. Dalnawillan. Rumsdale.

Grouse 1211-1/2 brace. 673 brace.
Sundries 88 brace. ----

This season was to me a red letter year in Scotch sport; very considerable success rewarded my personal endeavours in every way.

* * * * *

During the month of April I fished on the Thurso and on Loch More, as one of the party of eight rods, all fishing from Strathmore Lodge, and I killed fifty-three salmon.