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: WILD SPORTS AND ADVENTURES. W, H. MAXWELL, lllTHOR OF "THE BIVOUAC," "STORIES OF WATERLOO, " ETC. LONDON GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & CO. FARRINGDON STREET. 1857. SPOKTS AND ADVENTUEES TW TTTT!' ^ HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS SCOTLAND: A SEQUEL TO THE "WILD SPOETS OF THE WEST. BY W. H. MAXWELL, ESQ. AUTHOR OF ''STORIES OF WATERLOO/' ETC. NEW EDITION. LONDON: G. ROUTLEDGE & CO., FARHINGDON STREET. NEW YORK: 18, BEEKMAN STREET. 1857. — INTRODUCTION. Many things ia. life arise out of accidental circumstances; and books ai"e no exception. A very solitary location—in Kentucky parlance—vfitli " winter and bad weather," pro- duced the Wild Sports ot the West ; and to letters addressed to a kinsman, as an inducement to visit the far north, the " Sketches" now given to the world must date their origin. It is astonishing that the best resources which Britain possesses for the artist, the sportsman, and the idler, are little known, and lightly estimated. Within the four seas of I ^ Britain, and to the full scope of his bent, the man of science, ^^ and the man of pleasure, may indulge himself ; and the same * corner of the island which affords marvellous enjoyment to ^the sportsman, be he oniithor, auceps, or piscator, will also enrapture the painter, and puzzle the antiquary unto death. " A truant disposition" led the author of these Sketches into the scenes which have produced them. To trace out , half-forgotten battle-fields, and view the remnant of a feudal- keep or Border peel-house—sit among ruins where once "the bells were rung, and the mass was sung,"—or, in evening gray, throw moth or minnow on a stream which once tho -ruthless moss-trooper has crossed at midnight, the blazing )" 'beacon in his rear urging him onward to some wild fastness, wherein to secure his spoil, or shelter from the vengeance ^ some deed of violence had just provoked. - Travellers and tourists are variously influenced. One will ':: insist upon authenticated certificates of well-aired sheets; -another ''ut mos"—alas! I must spoil the quotation, and ^add "fuit,'''' as far as the quotation applies—requires nothing """beyond a root to shelter, and a rug to stretch upon. O^ie '"' southern gentleman" loves to dream the hour away wheiB the poet has framed his song, or the mighty remnants of monastic beauty attest the art that designed, and the royal .enthusiasm which erected these princely dwellings of au order, who, professing humility, obliged the sceptre to bend ^ A 2 I 4 INTRODUCTION. to the crosier, and laid the sandal of the tonsured monk on the mailed neck of the high-born crusader. Another—the humble disciple of old Izaak—who has dabbled in pond, canal, and " well-stocked watei-"—hears accidentally of the Tweed and Tay, and sets out upon a -^dsit to the Border. To view one saltation of a fresh-run .salmon, will reward the pilgrimage ; and if he fill a creel—as I have done in two brief hours— will he not marvel that, in piscatoral ignorance, un- happy citizens "of credit and renown" waste time about Lea- bridge, and money in adjacent hostelries, where some flavour- less fish, which on the Borders would be kicked away, is immortalized in a glass case ; and the skeleton of a pike, which, as a capture, every cowboy in Connemara could emu- late, is held out above the mantelpiece as an encouragement for cockneys to wet their feet, by proving that marshy M'aters are not ungrateful, and rheumatism shall have its reward. To tourists of a "gentler mood," those who employ the pencil or the rod, dislike damp clothing, and delight in com- fortable inns, I recommend the Border. To the rougher specimens of mankind—personages who have spent Christ- mas in the Bay of Biscay, or made a few Peninsular marches in bad weather, when the Iron Duke was in a hurry,-— would point out the northern Highlands, and the tar Orcades. Throughout the Land of Cakes, Chambers will prove an excel- lent ally—Anderson be invaluable as a Highland cicerone,— and, as a sea-coast companion, let them put fuU faith in the voyage of the jsleasantest Professor* in the realm. The land of the Gael is not the country wherein to sport purple and fine linen, Scotch mists bear a striking aflinity to an English planet-shower, and Mackintosh will be often foimd a friend in need. Irisli travellers are respectfully informed that fire- arms may be left at home, a pocket-pistol only being required. Charged heavily with pure alcohol, and presented at, or rather to a grumbling river-keeper, I have found its agency most ser\dceable. The Celtic race have not yet ranged them- selves beneath the banners of the water-drinking aj^ostle; and I never met a Highland heart to which Glenlivet and civility were not the surest and the speediest passports. * Cliriitopher North. tondon, January 1, 1844 ! !— — — EPISTLE TO JOHN O'FLAGHEETY, Esq. May 10, 1841. And have you never been up the Clyde ? What a confession for a finished traveller—one who has slidden on a glacier, and scratched his initials on a pillar of the Acropolis ! You have wasted years on the continent, and left unvisited one of the most glorious rivers in the world ;—and with such facili- ties,—steamers "from every point i' the seaman's card" splash- ing over its silver current every day but the seventh—ay, and even on that blessed one of rest, could you but put your faith in an Irish boiler and the prayers of the church, you might still reach Glasgow. Donald, no matter how hard he may struggle for "the siller," observes his sabbath punc- tiliously ;—but Pat, in the exuberance of his industry, Joins night to day, and Sunday to the week and while " the Lord of the Isles" cheek by jowl with " the Maid of Bute," rests idly beside the Bromielaw, "Nora Crina" comes frisking up the Frith, and " Daniel O'Connell" puffs and grumbles as he goes, noisy as his namesake before the rent-day, while fulminating tirades against Toryism, and persuading " the finest peasantry on earth" that mcdgre their virtues and deserts, they are, God help them! the worst- treated community in Christendom. Five-and-twenty j^ears, with one short interval, have passed, since I left the roof-tree of our fathers, a beardless boy. Of those who shared my earlier joys or sorrows but few remain. I come back, and all look strangely at me. The once rosy cheek of youth, bronzed by a tropic sun, forbids remem- brance; and in the bilious-looking colonel, none can tract the laughing cadet—and faith, no wonder For time, and care, and war have plougb'd My very soul from out my brow And can I marvel at this change in my outer man, /who can barely identify the premises where I was born ] Roman cement—everything in Ireland is Roman now—has super- seded the good old pebble-dashing of your mansion,—and within doors, the march of reform is still more evidenced. Where is the massive furniture, whose cumbrous frames and inky-looking mahogany bore the imprint of a century? where our grandmother's spinette ?—and where Tim Haddi- gan's bagpipes?—^that reed and chaunter which could dis- course such elegant music ! Gone—gone 6 INTRODUCTORY EPISTLE. I spent some restless hours in the little road-side inn, whi- ther I had repaired to catch the Dublin coach at daybreak. I could not sleep. I thought ol days jiassed by, and persons half forgotten. Scenes and actors once more appeared in shadowy review; and the last night before a young career upon the world commenced, came back more vividly than all. That night was memorable, Jack. Then you received, an honourable patronymic ; and a more ill-conditioned neoi^hyte never kicked in the arms of a divine. Seldom had the ancient roo>^'-tree covered a merrier group, and, in imagina- tion, I see them now. My honoured aunt, in the ripe bloom that marks a matron's beauty, sat in her high-backed chair, listening reverently to the baptismal prayer ; albeit the form belonged to another church, and from him by whom the holy I'ite was celebrated, she dissented conscientiously. But in those days a difference in religious faith did not matter a brass button. Popery was unobtrusive,—Protestants were tolerant,—Heaven was considered attainable by all ; —and, contrary to the more enlightened opinions of modern clerks, persons jDrofessing another creed were not, as a matter of course, consigned direct to Pandemonium. But to return to thy christening. — There stood my uncles, Jack—your father "looking every inch" an honest-hearted, hospitable fox-hunter, and his twin- brother, our uncle Antony; but of him you can have no recollection—for ere you were "a satchelled schoolboy," Antony Avas " under the grey stone," and reposing with his a^ncestors in Tubbermore. Antony was the teiTor of the whole community of Carmeen. When he spoke irreverently of the Pope himself. Father John Kelly did not venture a rebuke ; and, at the first creak of his shoe, the boldest spider- brr.sher fled from the presence. Antony, by his own account, " " was some fifty ; but by'r Lady," he was inclining to three- score." His years, with honest Jack's, were analogous, but in all besides the resemblance ended. Above six feet in height, in youth he was the " beau ideal" of a trooper, so far as a broad chest and light legs would go ; but he was now a gaunt, attenuated old man, bent double by rheumatism, and sorely crippled with the gout.

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