CHAPTER XVI 



THE WILD SHEEP OF WESTERN KANSU 



It is a remarkable and noteworthy fact that those 

 animals, with but few exceptions, which in a wild 

 state are most wary and intractable, become when 

 degraded by generations of domesticity more docile 

 and dependable tlian any. The ox tribe are 

 notoriously tierce and vindictive in a state of 

 nature, yet — in the East particularly — when im- 

 pressed into the service of man they perform such 

 useful services that without their aid the poorer 

 classes would scarcely be able to endure existence 

 at all. Similarly, the wild slieep, whose domes- 

 ticated relations furnish food and clothing to a large 

 proportion of the inhabitants of the globe, when an 

 object of pursuit amid his natural surroundings, 

 high mountain slopes and unscalable precipices, calls 

 into play every particle of skill and endurance which 

 the liunter possesses. From a stalker's point of 

 view lie is the king of game animals. It may be 

 taken as an axiom of mountain stalking that the 

 essence of success lies in getting above the quarry. 

 In the case of wild sheep, living as they do at great 

 altitudes, this usually involves several hours' hard 

 climbing in a rarified atmosphere on the part of 

 theii' pursuer. Their powers of vision are only 



138 



