72 JOURNAL, BOMB A Y NA TURA L HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XVIII. 



leg, standing about 11^ to 12 hands at the shoulder, and are of light^ 

 graceful build, more like an antelope, to my mind, than any other 

 species of wild sheep is, and huge though the horns are, they do not 

 make the heads look top-heavy. In colour the rams are of a mouse grey 

 on the body, dark on the back and lighter on the side and neck, while 

 the head, legs, belly, and inside the thighs are almost white. The horns, 

 with well developed transverse wrinklings, after forming a circle, make a 

 bold sweep outwards, which is the great characteristic of the head of 

 this species of wild sheep, and the weight of a big pair is so enormous 

 that one wonders how such a slender neck can carry them so easily, for 

 I have never seen a Poli lying with his head on the ground, as one so 

 frequently does big buck ibex, and markhor, as if they felt the weight of 

 their horns. 



Having studied them to my heart's content we crawled away, and 

 rode on to look for another lot, finding 5 more during the day, and 

 by the time we reached camp we had seen well over 100 rams, the 

 best of which was 56 to 57. Each time Begonde had tried to get 

 me to shoot one, getting very sulky at last at my continual refusal, 

 and declaring that we should never find better ones, and that I had 

 let off several splendid heads, all over 60. It was the same story every 

 day and at last he began to get on my nerves to such an extent, that I 

 told Rahima I felt sure I should lose my temper one day, and should 

 shoot one of Begonde's big rams, just to prove to him that we were 

 right and he wrong about the heads, and it came off even sooner than I 

 expected. We started off in the dark one bitterly cold morning, when 

 my temper was much like that of the proverbial bear with a sore head, 

 and just after daybreak came on a band of rams, when the light was 

 still bad, so we dismounted and went on to get a near view of them. 

 They were slowly working their way up hill, led by a ram, which 

 Begonde at once declared had a grand head and said to Rahima 

 " What is the good of my showing the Sahib big heads, when he will 

 not shoot at any of them"? Rahima passed this remark on and it was 

 too much for me, as I could see with the naked eye it was not a big 

 head, but my temper was up, so I took the rifle, and though Rahima 

 who had got his glasses out by then, called out "Do not shoot, Sahib, 

 it is only about 50." I fired, as I meant having that ram if I could, 

 and of course, as it really was a small one, dropped it, and told Begonde 

 to go and look at his big head. He did not come back, so we joined 

 him and found him contemplating, with a very crestfallen face, a 



