. . . haver! I got £25 compensation, but would rather have Tweed than eighty pounds.”
“If a sheep were stolen, would you recognize it as yours?” “Aye, as soon as I had had a look at it.” I broached the subject of sheep-bells. “Bells,” he exclaimed, with considerable scorn, “no, that’s all a haver.” (Here he paused to translate this word for the benefit of Southrons—“all rot”—personally, I much prefer the Scots word.) “Why, ma sheep run over country seven miles by three. Ye waddna heer the bells at all, and ye’d be lucky if ye saw some of the sheep more than once a year. Yet I did na lose any, and once I was one sheep to the gude, and they gave it to me.”
His Highland flock was brought together three times a year, for dipping, for shearing, and for sales. On those occasions, he and his men started very early in the morning, went around the outskirts of the run, and drove all the sheep they could find a mile or two inwards. The next day they repeated this, and pushed the flock back another stage, and so on, until, after some days, the sheep were all pressed inwards to one spot, such as the shore of a convenient loch.
It is now compulsory to dip sheep twice a year, he informed me, the first time before August 31st, and the second before November 12th. “They have you scheduled, and they know who has dipped and who hasn’t. The November dip is foolish, but the August dip is aw recht. Everybody wad dip in the summer because of the fly, but to do it . . .”