HOW COOK STARTED 57 



head of game, the giraffe, zebra, eland, gazelle, and hartebeest, herding to- 

 gether. The leopard is probably more dangerous than the tiger or lion, next 

 to the rhinoceros the most formidable of all animals." 



Bradley's expedition into Asia was even more thrilling. He was able to 

 make the hunt through the courtesy of the Russian government, but he met 

 with considerable trouble with the secret police. Finally, he was given what 

 was said to have been the strongest credentials ever issued to a traveler in 

 those parts. 



"I shot through the mountains in June, July, and August," he wrote in 

 reference to this expedition. "It was the mildest part of the year, yet the 

 storms were terrific and the cold almost unendurable. Even in those summer 

 months the blizzards raged, and I had to sit in my tent, wrapped in furs all 

 day long, with nothing to do but just smoke and recall the scenes of my recent 

 trip under the burning skies of equatorial Africa. 



"The Atlai mountain sheep is the highest Hver known. To get one of 

 these animals requires a lot of dangerous climbing in a country so stupendous 

 that you could drop Switzerland and a dozen Yosemite valleys into it and 

 miss them. 



"Hardly a day passed that I did not see from sixty to lOO sheep, but 

 I could not get near enough to fire a shot. There were plenty of ibex, Mon- 

 golian gazelles, big gray wolves, bear, and deer, but it was the sheep that 

 I was after. They are considered the hardest of game to stalk. 



"I found the ibex, like the Rocky mountain goat, to be a stupid animal, 

 always looking down instead of up. So if the hunter gets above them he 

 can lie in wait behind the rocks until the animals are feeding on the moss 

 below and then bring down the game. 



In talking of Cook's trip Mr. Bradley took pains to explain that the 

 Brooklyn explorer's success in reaching the North Pole was not so much the 

 result of chance as the opinion of several polar experts would indicate. "This 

 was no haphazard expedition," he said, "no intensified Arctic joy ride under- 

 taken on nerve. We went about our preparations for this thing quietly and 

 without brassband accompaniment, but every imaginable contingency had been 

 provided for. 



"We studied out the mistakes and misfortunes of other men who had 

 tried for the pole, hoping to benefit by their errors, and we certainly benefited 

 by their examples. 



"I am not going to tell what the cost was, but I'll tell you this much : One 

 single item of the equipment was 5,000 gallons of gasoline and another was 



