"When advancing upon deer [say our authors]--except in strange ground--the forester, or any other attendant, should be left behind a stone, or in some covert, before the stalker commences his approach; not from any recognition of the false reproach made against the guides by Mr Scrope, but because there is no occasion for an assistant, and the action of one has more celerity, independence, and security from discovery, than when a greater number are in motion. The charge made by the author of 'The Art of Deer-stalking,' that the forester is often in the way, and sometimes obstructs the shot, is not true, unless in instances of inexperienced and awkward individuals, who are not to be found among that class of foresters of whom the guest of the _Atholl Forest_ proposes his remarks. With a MacKenzie, or a MacDonald, a Catanach, and a MacHardie, the asserted inconvenience must proceed from the ignorance or maladroitness of the gray worm which crawls at his back, and who often does not know what he is doing, or where he is going, with his ideas _égaré_ on his sensitive knees and varnished Purdie, unconscious of what he ought to do and nervous for what he ought not, flurried with eagerness and disgusted with his posture, and who, never seeing a deer except once in the year, is led up to him like a 'blind burraid,' by one whose language he scarcely understands. In general, therefore, the embarrassments of the 'creep' are those of the superior, who is frequently so ignorant, unpractised, and dependent upon the guidance of the forester, that to be '_taken up to the deer_' has become the modern forest phrase for the approach of the sportsman. This contemptible term, and its contemptible practice, has only been introduced within the last quarter century, since the prevalence of stalking gentlemen utterly unacquainted with the ground and pursuit of deer. Of old, the '_Seàlgair uasal nam bèann_' was initiated to the hill when yet but a '_biorach_' of a stalker; and when he became a matured hill-man, he should no more have suffered himself to be--'_taken up_ to his deer' by an attendant, than a Melton fox-hunter to be trained after the hounds by a whipper-in with a leading rein.--What should have been the sentiments of the old chiefs and Uaislean of the last century--the Dukes of Atholl and Gordon--Glengarrie--John Aberardar--Iain dubh Bhail-a-Chroäin--to hear a deer-hunter speak of being '_taken up to his deer_!'--Certainly that he was a noble 'amadan' or 'gille-crùbach,' who had not the faculties or the limbs to act for himself.--But this is only one of the many instances for which the hills of Gael may mourn with the mountains of Gilboa--'_Quomodo ceciderunt robusti!_'"