XVII
THE SECRET OF THE HIGH HILLS
“I shall never forget that day, or the self-sacrifice and bravery
of those men in that Brigade.” The speaker was a chaplain attached
to one of the Highland Brigades which had been fighting in France.
“We were told that a particular position had to be taken, and the
work was allotted to certain of the Highland regiments. My work
was to attend the dying after the attack was over and the position
carried at the point of the bayonet. Amongst them was a piper who
had shown extraordinary bravery in the assault, and who, though
wounded three times, had persisted in carrying on and playing his
pipes until he fell mortally wounded just as the assault, after
very heavy fighting, was proving successful. He knew he was dying,
and gave me messages for his wife and family. He was evidently a
man of strong faith, and had no fear of death. Just before his
valiant spirit passed away, he whispered, ‘Oh, if I could only see
the high hills again before I die.’ His words deeply impressed me,
and I have often thought of them since.”
This story of the dying piper, told to me in such simple and
touching language, set me thinking and wondering. I could not help
feeling that those last words of the gallant Highlander would
strike a sympathetic chord in the hearts not only of those whose
most cherished and sacred memories are bound up with the Highlands
of Scotland, but of countless numbers of others who also love
that country. In the days of peace I had often pondered over the
irresistible fascination of this call from the North.
The Highlands of Scotland! Is there any one who has ever seen
them, or who knows even slightly something of their romantic and
enchanting history, who can fail to understand the passionate
devotion of any one with Highland blood in his veins to that
wonderful land?
“All the world over the sons of the heather and the mist, in
however distant or alien lands they may be, feel always, as they
steer their way through life, that there is a pole-star by which
they set their compass; and that some day, perhaps, they or their
children may steer the boat to a haven on some rocky shore, where
the whaup calls shrilly on the moors above the loch, and the
heather grows strong and tough on the hill-side, and the peat reek
rises almost like the incense of an evening prayer against a grey,
soft sky in the land of the north.”[35]
From the lone shieling on the misty island
Mountains divide us, and a waste of seas.
Yet still the blood is strong, the heart is highland,
And we in dreams behold the Hebrides.[36]
How many a man at the end of July or the beginning of August, worn
out with his work in Parliament, or the Law Courts, or elsewhere,
turns his face and his thoughts to the North, and finds even in
his anticipations and dreams of the days to come refreshment and
solace! In most things in this life the anticipation is far greater
than the reality, but not so in this case. In the hearts of how
many men and women do the words of Aytoun find a responsive echo:
Give me but one hour of Scotland,
* * * * *
Southern gales are not for me;
Though the glens are white with winter,
Place me there and set me free.
Why is it that so many persons, young and old, and of such
different character, habits, and classes, are fascinated and held
by the spell of this country? What is the motive which is common
to them all, if there is one? No doubt with some it is the longing
for rest and change of scene, or the opportunity of meeting old
friends or relatives in the far North, with others the desire for
sport or the gratification of artistic tastes, and with others the
ardent yearning to hear again the old familiar sounds, familiar
since their early childhood--the sound of the rushing burn, the
breaking of the sea on the rock-bound shore, the call of the
sea-birds--and to see once more the high hills and silvery lochs
and scent again the fragrant heather. But underlying all these,
and perhaps more often than not quite unconsciously, there is one
dominant governing motive which is surely spiritual rather
than material--the desire for the environment which will uplift
and ennoble, and with it bring a sense of being nearer to the
pure--nearer to the things that are unseen and eternal--removed
from all that is coarse and material.
[Illustration: “THE MORNING COMETH.”
By FINLAY MACKINNON.]
I well remember on one occasion discussing the question of the
future world with a Highland keeper, and the emphatic way in which
he said, “One thing is certain, and that is, that no one could be
an atheist if he spent his life on the mountains.” I also remember
that, curiously enough, the same observation was made by one
Cambridge undergraduate to another, the speaker having been in the
habit of spending days and nights camping out on the mountains in
his father’s Highland property.
It is not inappropriate that in the Gaelic language the words
used to signify “death” and “died” are not the same when used in
reference to a human being as the words which are used in reference
to an animal, the former words, _caochladh_ (substantive),
_chaochail_ (verb), signifying a change or passing from one state
of life into another, the latter _bas_ (substantive), _bhasaich_
(verb), extinction or annihilation.
On the sea coast, at the mouth of one of the sea lochs on the west
coast of Ross-shire, I have often waited for the dawn, looking up
the loch towards the high hills in the distance, and, whilst I
waited, there would come into my mind those impressive words of the
prophet Isaiah, “Watchman, what of the night?” The watchman said,
“The morning cometh.” No one who has had this experience and seen
the sun rise in its splendour over the high hills, flooding the
surface of the sea with brilliant crimson light, will ever forget
the scene, or the uplifting of spirit and sense of abiding peace
which it imparted.
INDEX
_Acanthyllis caudacuta_, 40, 55
_Acanthyllis gigantea_, 55
Aeroplane, observations on flight of birds from, 50
Age of stags, 110-11
Air speed, 25
_A Joy for Ever_, 181
Alpine swift, 41-2, 49-53, 56-7
American golden plover, 33
_An Angler’s Paradise_, 191
Applecross, 141-2
_Apus_, 53
Armour, G. Denholm, 58
Attadale, 73
Australia, birds of fastest flight in, 54
_Avicultural Magazine_, 54 _n._
Aytoun, 218
Baker, E. Stuart, 55
Balfour-Browne, Vincent, 164
Bas, 217
Bhasaich, 217
Birds, speeds of various British, 35-6
Birds of Australia, twelve swiftest, 54
_Birds of Europe, History of_, 53 _n._
Birds of Fastest Flight in the British Isles, 23-70
_Birds of Great Britain_, 146
Birds of prey, 39-52, 57-70, 136-54
Blackcock, 35, 37, 45, 50, 58-9, 65, 138
Black game, killed by peregrines and eagles, 29, 66, 137-8, 149
Blaine, Captain G. S., 45, 148
Blanford, W. T., 56
Blue rock pigeons, 35, 44-5
Bond, William Walpole, 47
_Book of the Sea Trout_, 192
British Museum (Natural History), 41
Browne, Bishop G. F., 22 _n._
Buzzard, 49
Caberslach, 74
Calf, deer, attacked by eagle, 142
_Canadian Boat Song_, 217
Caochladh, 219
Capercailzie, probably fastest flying game bird, 45, 50
Carter, H. R. P., 57
Cats, killed by eagles, 138
_Chaetura_, 51, 53
_Chaetura caudacuta caudacuta_, 40, 53, 55
_Chaetura caudacuta cochinchinensis_, 55
_Chaetura nudipes_, 55-6, 57
Chaochail, 217
Chaytor, Arthur H., K.C., 93-5
Clough, Arthur Hugh, 21
Coignafearn, Forest of, 71
Common swift, 40-42, 46, 49, 50, 53
Corvidae, 36
Crealock, Lieut.-General, 204
Crow, killed by eagle, 68-9
Culture, trout, 189
Curlew, 36, 69
Currachd an righ, 179
_Cypselus apus_, 40
_Cypselus melba_, 40
Danger of wounded stags, 157
Deer, Homing Instincts of Wounded, 123-35
Deer calves, attacked by eagles, 139
Deer-hounds, 128
Deer-stalking, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6-11, 97-112, 123-35, 155-64, 170-81,
197-214
_Deer-stalking in the Highlands of Scotland_, 204
Depth of loch for good trout fishing, 196
Downward flight of the eagle, 57-70
Dresser, Henry E., 53, 53 _n._ 55
_Dry-Fly Man’s Handbook_, 194
Duck, wild, 28-9, 36, 70, 136
Duck-shooting, 165
Duel between eagle and peregrine, 61-2
Eagle, 36-7, 49, 57-9, 62-5, 67, 69, 70, 107, 136-8, 142, 153
attack on a full-grown stag, 139
downward flight of, 57-60
food of, 38, 136-7
weight of, 60
Eggs, number of trout, 195
Eleonora’s falcons, 51
_Falco candicans_, 38
_Falco gyrfalco_, 38
_Falco islandus_, 38
Falconer, 34, 36, 152
Falcons, 28, 30, 36, 43, 46, 51-2, 57-60, 62, 68, 70, 143-5, 149,
151, 153
Eleonora’s, 51
Greenland, 38-9
Iceland, 38-9
Northern, 38-9, 57
Fastest bird in British Isles, 57, 70
Fealar, 74, 170
_Field Studies of some Rarer British Birds_, 47
Fighting, stags killed in, 73
Finlayson, John, stalker, Killilan, 66
Finlayson, stalker, Applecross, 142
Fisher, Major C. H., 149
Fishing, fly-, 13-22, 92-5, 113-22
minnow-, 93
salmon, 12-22, 85
Flight in the British Isles, Birds of Fastest, 23-70
of the eagle, downward, 57
horizontal, 37
Forest, Stormy Week in the, 97-112
Fox cubs, killed by eagles, 138
dens, 139
Fresh-water shrimp, 184
Frigate bird, 54
_Fuligula ferina_, 30
Gaelic sayings and words, 111, 179, 219
Gannet, downward flight of, 63
Geese, speed of, 36
Glen Carron Forest, 8
Glen Shieldaig Forest, 140
Golden eagle (_see_ Eagle) weight of the, 60
plover, 32-3, 35-6, 43, 45-6, 57, 69
American, 33
Goose, solan, 63
Goshawks, 143
Gould, John, F.R.S., 54, 146
Green Plover, 35
Greenland Falcon, 38-9
Greyhen, 149
Ground speed, 25
Grouse, 29, 59, 68, 107, 136-7, 144-146, 149-51, 153
Gulls, 43
Gyrfalcon, weight of the, 60
Gyrfalcons, 38-40, 57, 60, 63, 66
Halford, F. M., 191 _n._, 194
Hares, killed by eagles, 136, 138
Harrier, 49
Hartley, Gilfrid W., 197
Hawk, sparrow-, 49, 143, 147-8
Hawks, 30, 48, 136, 142-53
Hereford, 88
Highlands of Scotland, fascination of, 216
Hobby, 45-6, 49
Homing Instincts of Wounded Deer, 123-35
Hounds, deer-, 128
Hummel, 74
Hurrell, H. G., 39
Hutton, J. Arthur, 94-5
Iceland falcon, 38-9
Jackdaw, 35
Jura, 111
Kestrel, 35, 49, 142
Killilan, 66
King’s night-cap, 179
Kite, 49
Lambs, killed by eagles, 138
_Lame Dog’s Diary_, 217
Landrail, speed of, 35
Last Stalk of the Season, 170-81
_Letters to a Salmon Fisher’s Sons_, 93
_Life History and Habits of Salmon, etc._, 190, 193
Loch Carron, 10
Leven, 185
trout, 191
Luichart, 204
problem, 182
Lodges in the Highlands, highest shooting, 171
Lost in the Forest, 209
Macdougall, stalker, Fealar, 171
McIver, Donald, 66
Mackay, John, stalker, North Jura, 111
Mackenzie, Alick, stalker, Applecross, 141
Maclennan, watcher, Coignafearn, 72
Macnaughtan, S., 217
Mallard, 30-31, 33-5, 70
Malloch, P. D., 190, 191 _n._, 192-3, 196
Mar Forest, 74
Marryat, 194
Matheson, Donald, stalker, Glen Shieldaig, 140
Meinertzhagen, D.S.O., Colonel R., 27, 31, 33, 35, 42, 50, 52
Merlin, 35, 45-6, 49, 147
Mesopotamia, swifts in, 50
Minnow-fishing for salmon, 93
Mosul, swifts in, 50
Muckle Hart of Ben More, 164
Murray, Charles J., Esq., of Loch Carron, 10, 140
Natural History Museum at South Kensington, 41
_Natural History of Sport in Scotland with Rod and Gun_ (Speedy),
150, 191, 205
Nature’s cures of wounded deer, 196-914
Needle-tailed swift, 40, 52-3
Nerve Centres in deer, 214
Northern falcons, 38-9, 57
Orrin, 149
Otter, salmon killed by, 20, 86
Partridges, 27, 99, 35, 147, 149
Passeres, smaller, 36
Patt Forest, 66
Peregrine, horizontal flight of, 26-40, 42, 45-6, 49, 52, 137
downward flight of, 57-63, 68-70
food of, 38
how it strikes its prey, 142-54
weight of, 60
Perils, of stalkers, 81
_Peschiera_, 21
Petrels, 43
Pheasants, 29, 35, 58-9, 144-5
Pigeons, 37, 44-5
blue rock, 44-5
rock-, 51
speed of, 36
wood, 35, 152
Plover, 33
American golden, 33
golden, 32-3, 35-6, 43, 45-6, 57, 69
green, 35
“Poca buidhè,” 180
Pochard, 30-31, 45
Portal, D.S.O., Captain C. F. A., 26, 34, 52, 146, 151
Prey, birds of (_see_ Birds of prey)
Ptarmigan, 3, 65, 107, 136
Rabbits, 136
Radclyffe, Major C. R. E., 28-30, 34, 39, 44, 65, 143, 151
Red sedge, 186
_Reminiscences of a Falconer_, 149
Robinson, W. H., 69
Rock-pigeon, 51
Rook, 35, 154
Royal stag, 80, 174, 179, 204
Ruskin, 181
St. John, Charles, 32, 164
Salmon fishing, 12-22, 85-96, 113-122
Salmon Loch in Sutherland, 113-22
Sanctuary, 123
Saunders, Howard, 53 _n._
Secret of the High Hills, 215-20
Sedge, cinnamon, 186
red, 186
Seebohm, 54
Sheringham, H. T., 96
Shooting, duck-, 165
Shrimp, fresh-water, 184
Shrimp-weed, 184
Snipe, 28-9, 65
Solan goose, 63
Sovenson, E. S., 54
Sparrow-hawks, 49, 143, 147-8
Speed, air, 25
ground, 25
of Australian birds, 54
Speeds of British birds, table of, 35-6
fastest, 57, 70
Speedy, Tom, 151-3
Speedy’s _Natural History of Sport in Scotland with Rod and Gun_,
205
Spine-tailed swift, 40-42, 51-3, 55-57, 70
Spring-tide, 165
Stags, age of, 110-11
attacking stalkers, wounded, 155
danger of wounded 157
eagles attack full-grown, 139
stalking (_see_ Deer-stalking)
Stalkers, 64, 71
wounded stags attacking, 155
Stalking, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6-11, 71-84, 97-112, 123-35, 155-64, 170-81,
197-214
mistakes in, 6-10
_Stalks Abroad_, 156
Starling, 35-6
Stormy Week in the Forest, 97-112
Strathconan, 66-7
Stuart, Hamish, 192
Surgeon of the Deer Forest, 196-214
Sutherland, A Salmon Loch in, 113
Swallows, 43
Swan, 152
Swift, 36, 40, 42-8, 50-51
Alpine, 41-2, 49-53, 56-7
common, 40-42, 46, 49-50, 53
needle-tailed _or_ spine-tailed, 40-42, 51-3, 55, 70
Switch-horn, 73-4
Tame pigeons, 36
Teal, 28, 33-6, 46, 57
Tennyson, 21 _n._
Three, luck in number, 92
Tickell, 55
Tiercel, 42, 46
Tracker, 128
Trout eggs, number of, 195
loch, how to improve, 182-96
Velocity of falling birds, 61
Waders, speed of, 36
Wallace, Frank, 156
Weight, influence of in flight, 30, 60
of the eagle, 60
of the gyrfalcon, 60
of the peregrine, 60
Wild duck, 28-9, 36-70
_Wild Sport with Gun, Rifle, and Salmon Rod_, 197
_Wild Sports and Natural History of the Highlands_, 37, 164
Willoughby, Colonel the Hon. Claude, 141
Wings, 54, 58, 142, 145, 150
Witherby, H. F., 53 _n._
Wood pigeon, 35, 152
Woodcock, 28-30
Wounded Deer, Homing Instincts of, 123-35
stags, attacking stalkers, 155-64
danger of, 81, 157
Wye, river, 12, 85
_Printed in Great Britain by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_.
FOOTNOTES.
[1] “The Death of the Wye,” _Images and Meditations, a Book of
Poems_, by Mary Duclaux. T. Fisher Unwin, Ltd., London.
[2] It is singular that this poem was written and published in
1849, and that Tennyson’s _In Memoriam_, which contained the famous
lines:
“’T is better to have loved and lost,
Than never to have loved at all,”
was written in 1834 but not published until 1850, and then
anonymously. This is surely very remarkable, for it is impossible
to believe that a man of the high and noble character of Clough
would have consciously plagiarised any other poet.
[3] After the publication of these verses in the above article, as
it originally appeared in the issue of _Country Life_ for August
6, 1921, their authorship was discovered through the kindness of
some of the readers of that journal and the enterprise of its
editor. In a letter in _Country Life_ for August 27, 1921, Bishop
G. F. Browne, late Lord Bishop of Bristol, thus describes their
origin. “The first three stanzas were composed at Lowick Rectory,
Northants, by the rector, J. S. Watson, his daughter Betty, and
Dean Ingram of Peterborough. The authors felt that there ought to
be a concluding stanza, ambiguously stating a final result. I told
the story to Father Waggett on our way from Bournemouth to Clouds,
and he suggested ‘booked it’ as the point of a last stanza. On that
hint I wrote the stanza. In my book I remark that its tendency
would be unjust to any real fisherman’s imaginative powers.”
[4] December 11, 18, 25, 1921.
[5] January 28, February 4, 11, 18, 1922.
[6] _Field_, February 18, 1922, p. 233.
[7] “Velocity of Flight among Birds,” by Colonel R. Meinertzhagen,
D.S.O., in the _Ibis_ for April 1921, pp. 237-238.
[8] _Field_, February 18, 1922, p. 234.
[9] _Wild Sports of the Highlands_, chap. x. p. 135.
[10] _Field_, February 18, 1922, pp. 233-234.
[11] _Ibis_, April 1921, p. 234.
[12] _Wild Sports and Natural History of the Highlands_, by Charles
St. John, ch. x. p. 131.
[13] See also the letter of Mr. H. G. Hurrell in the _Field_ for
March 8, 1923.
[14] This is a very considerable warning--H. F.
[15] Pp. 258-259 (Witherby & Co., London, 1914).
[16] Pp. 35, 36.
[17] _Manual of British Birds_, by Howard Saunders, 2nd ed. (Gurney
& Jackson, London), pp. 264, 266.
[18] _History of the Birds of Europe_, by Henry E. Dresser, F.L.S.,
F.Z.S. (1871-1881), vol. iv. p. 617.
[19] _A Practical Handbook of British Birds_, edited by H. F.
Witherby, vol. ii. pp. 7, 9. Witherby & Co., London, 1920.
[20] _Handbook to the Birds of Australia_, by John Gould, F.R.S.
(1865), vol. i. p. 104. London.
[21] Vol. ii. p. 305, Porter, 6 Tenterden Street, W.; Dulau & Co.,
Soho Square, W., 1884.
[22] _Avicultural Magazine_, Third Series, vol. x. No. 4, February
1919, pp. 73-74.
[23] Vol. iv. p. 616.
[24] _British Birds Magazine_, vol. xvi. No. 1 (June 1, 1922), p.
31.
[25] _The Fauna of British India including Ceylon and Burma Birds_,
vol. iii. p. 173. Published under the authority of the Secretary of
State for India in Council. Taylor & Francis, London, 1895.
[26] _Ibid._ p. 174.
[27] March 15, 1923.
[28] _Ornithological Dictionary of Birds_, by Col. G. Montagu: 2nd
edition by James Rennie, London, 1831.
[29] _Rough Shooting_, by Richard Clapham, ch. vii. pp. 125-126.
Heath Cranton, Ltd., London, 1922.
[30] In _One Hundred Years in the Highlands_, p. 132 (Edward
Arnold, London, 1921), Mr. Osgood Mackenzie quotes an extract from
a diary of his uncle, Dr. John Mackenzie of Eileanach, in which an
incident of this kind is described as having occurred in Kinlochewe
Forest.
[31] Adam & Charles Black, London, 1910.
[32] See, for instance, the opinions of Mr. F. M. Halford in
_The Dry-Fly Man’s Handbook_, p. 395 (George Routledge & Sons,
Ltd., London); Mr. P. D. Malloch at p. 179 in the work previously
cited; Mr. J. J. Armistead in _An Angler’s Paradise, and how to
obtain it_; and Mr. Tom Speedy in _The Natural History of Sport in
Scotland with Rod and Gun_ (William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh and
London, 1920).
[33] Martin Secker, London, 1917.
[34] _The Dry-Fly Man’s Handbook_, p. 319 (George Routledge & Sons,
Ltd., London).
[35] _A Lame Dog’s Diary_, by S. Macnaughtan, pp. 239, 240 (John
Murray, London, 1915).
[36] “Canadian Boat Song,” _St. Andrew’s Treasury of Scottish
Verse_, by Mrs. Alexander Lawson and Alexander Lawson, pp. 133, 134
(A. & C. Black, Ltd., London, 1920).
* * * * *
Transcriber’s note:
Inconsistent use of hyphens, such as burn-side/burnside and
gyr-falcon/gyrfalcon, has been retained.
Page viii: M^cIver (superscript c) changed to McIver to match other
instances in the book.
Index: “Cats, killed by eagles, 38” changed to “Cats, killed by
eagles, 138”.