“Give it up?” Chester exclaimed. “Not Ben Nevis. I guess Ben Nevis would be the biggest disappointment to a deluge since old man Noah. Any deluge that thinks it can stand between Ben Nevis and shooting a stag had better start in to think again and remember what it felt like to be a puddle.”

The stalking novice left his wife and went down to join his host.

“Ah, there you are. That’s better. I hope you didn’t mind my suggesting you toned down your colour scheme, what? I mean to say, I’m a very old hand at this game and I do want to give you some idea of what a grand sport stalking is. You’ll hear the young people to-day running it down. Why? Laziness. Sheer unadulterated laziness. It’s those confounded motor-cars. What they want now is to be driven practically to the butts and then have the birds driven to them, with a loader standing by. Then a rich lunch and be driven to the next moor and if they don’t kill at least a hundred brace each they think they’ve had a poor day’s sport. Sport? That’s not sport. That’s nothing but luxury. Of course, fellows like that aren’t up to a long day in the hills. But you’re different, Royde. You want real sport and I’m going to do my best to let you have some. But you mustn’t mind my giving you advice. You’ve just bought the best twelve-head forest in Inverness-shire, and by gad, you bought it for a song. However, Kilwhillie got twice what he ought to have got from that bounder Dutton for Glenbore, and there’s no doubt Knocknacolly Lodge isn’t what it was. It never was as a matter of fact, but luckily you can afford to put it in order. I’m hoping to get a cable from my boy Hector to-day to say he’s got his leave. Now, he’s just as keen on stalking as I know you’re going to be, and I taught him the whole art of it. Because it is an art. You’ll hear people talking about painting and poetry and all that sort of thing, but of course if it comes to real art they’re not in it with stalking.”

The majestic splendours of the Three Sisters of Glenbogle have been hymned too often to encourage a late comer in the field of Highland romance to venture upon an encore. It is enough to say that by nine o’clock that morning Ben Nevis, Chester Royde and big Duncan Macdonald were in the midst of them. The sky was heavily overcast, but the rain still held off.