Mountain, Moor and Water
The Highlands of Scotland. By Seton Gordon. (Robert Hale. County Books Series. 18s.) IT may be wondered why a series which assigns two separate volumes to the Inner and Outer Hebrides should confine to a single volume a region extending from Cape Wrath to the Trossachs and from Ardnamurchan to Deeside, rich beyond almost all others in this island, not only in natural beauty and wild life but in legendary, historical and romantic associations. The writer on whom so narrow a limit is imposed may either confine himself to the thorough con- sideration of a few aspects of his subject or allow his choice to be dictated by his own personal taste and experience, and it will surprise no one acquainted with Mr. Seton Gordon or his earlier books to find that he inclines strongly to the second course.
Topographically, it is true, he takes his reader in due sequence, though somewhat discursively, from the neighbourhood of Glasgow to the wilds of Sutherland ; but there are certain districts, notably the Cairngorms, and certain topics, such as hill-walking and bird- watching, fishing and piping, which lie nearest his heart and most easily inspire his pen. Ptarmigan and salmon play a larger part than crofters and shepherds, and, though he deals briefly in his introduc- tion with the present social and economic condition of the Highlands, his chief interest plainly lies elsewhere, and he confines himself on the whole to the description of nature and to the evocation of the past. There is no mention, for instance, either of the factories of Kinlochleven or of the Great Glen Cattle Ranch, or even of such a phenomenon as the survival of Catholicism in certain districts ; but if the reader wants a fairly full narrative of such episodes as the tragedy of the house of Ardvorlich or the Appin Murder (this, curiously enough,-without any reference to Kidnapped) he will findit here.
There is a good deal of Gaelic here and there, and one is glad to be told the meanings and origins., real or reputed, of a large number of place-names, many of which lead the author on to relate. a legend. But Mr. Seton Gordon, though clearly a romantic, is first and fore- most .a naturalist and a lover of nature, and it is in his description of days-and nights spent in lonely places at all times of-the year and in his observation of plants and animals, especially birds, that he excels. This is not a book which will make much appeal to the summer tourist who does not wander far from the few great main roads of the Highlands. The instructions for crossing Mam Ratagan by car strike an almost incongruous note in a book in which it is perfectly natural, though extremely startling, to read that it was once possible to travel first-class return from Aberdeen to Aviemore for half-a- crown. Those, however, whose acquaintance with the Highlands goes deeper, however slight their botany and ornithology, will find their memories of what they have seen enriched and a desire stimulated to extend their knowledge of wild spaces of mountain and moor and Water, whose existence in this island when one is the south seems almost incredible. It is no small achievement in the author that he succeeds in conveying so well the atmosphere of the country, and that this success is not dependent on the many excellent and well chosen photographs with which the volume is illustrated.
The writing is simple and unpretentious, apart from a tiresomely recurrent use of " he who " for the simple relative. A few of the personal reminiscences are too trivial to be interesting, and there is a slight flavour of the shooting lodge and the sporting' tenant on some pages which seems almost anachronistic. There are also a few slips, of which the most important is that on page 266 Ben Nevis (? Ben Wyvis) is said to overlook the Cromarty Firth. The title of one illustration, " Near Second Coast, Ross-shire,"-is an enigma to your reviewer. Many who will find pleasure in the book would have been glad of a small bibliography of earlier travellers to whom reference is
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