For, behind the plain façade, works one of Scotland’s – and the world’s – pre-eminent gunmakers, a man who, since 1957, has been the de facto guardian one of the country’s great traditional skills.

The man in question, David McKay Brown, was sitting at his desk clad in an oily apron, watched over by the impressive presence of a mounted Cape buffalo bull. On the far wall was a cabinet containing a number of guns and rifles, and even from a distance it was clear that these were no ordinary firearms.

After a friendly introduction to his wife, Alexe – as administrative guru, an essential part of the business – and the buffalo, a thousand-pound monster McKay Brown shot in Zimbabwe, he began to tell me something about the gunmaker’s art. But, before we started, he advised me of the need to speak up, as years of firing guns and rifles in pursuit of sporting quarry had left their mark on McKay Brown’s hearing.

Scotland, he explained, has played an important role in the development of firearms, from the Reverend Alex Forsyth, the inventor of the percussion principle, to Alexander Henry, the man behind the famous breech-loading rifle, the Martini-Henry, which was used to such great effect by Britain’s imperial troops.

As far as shotguns are concerned, he continued, our geographical detachment from London and Birmingham made us ‘an innovative island in gunmaking’. This isolation led to a new style of gun, the round action, which was first produced in 1887.

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