The guns had to ride ponies from three to eight miles to get to their beats, men and dogs walking on beforehand, so that nearly half the time and labour was taken up in travelling to and fro', but as it turned out it did not matter much.
The moor was a fine moor, with fine heather, but with too much green ground upon it.
It included some of the high Grampians, and marched with the Mar Forest on the one end, and with Caen Lochan Forest on the east side.
For those who cared to climb 3000 feet and more, and risk sprained limbs on the roughest of broken rocks and boulders, there was a fair sprinkling of ptarmigan.
I was fairly well dogged, I had my brace of dogs, and beforehand on faith I had bought a middle aged pointer bitch from the keeper for £5, and a very good purchase she was; later on I bred some very good puppies from her and my dog Rap, and in addition to her I had my brace of dogs and my English keeper to complete my team.
We all reached the Spital, hiring from Blairgowrie, a day or two before the 12th, in high spirits and hopes for the coming fray.
The morning after our arrival my keeper came to me with a very long face, he had got it from the gillie that we were done, fairly done brown, that there was literally nothing on the ground. The moor was very high, nothing under 1500 feet above the sea, rising to 3000 feet, the limit of heather, and a severe snow storm late on in the spring had killed the young birds and driven down the old ones to lower ground, the lower moors below us were full of birds.
I was very down in the mouth. I had, as I thought, taken every precaution, and was also rather full of my cleverness at getting into what I took to be so good a thing, and had bragged considerably; but at the same time would scarcely credit that such an extent of fine ground could hold nothing. I said nothing, but waited for the outcome.
On the morning of the Twelfth we went through the usual routine of ponies, pannier ponies, gillies, dogs, &c., returning at night with a dozen brace of old birds amongst us, perhaps not so many.