HUNTING THE WILD GOAT 171 



the wild Spanish goat the term argali or chamois, the 

 sport would be without a flaw. To take this wild 

 goat one must sail over fifty miles of ocean and climb 

 some cliffs and caiions that have peculiarities which 

 render the hunting as difficult as in many high moun- 

 tains where mountain sheep is the game. From this 

 caiion south or east San Clemente abounds in wild 

 goats. The only note of warning I would sound is, 

 that a hunter in these mountains requires a guide and 

 companion, and should never make a long trip alone. 



The following year our camp was at Mosquito Har- 

 bor, about four miles from the east end. Here the 

 cliffs are extremely abrupt and precipitous. For long 

 distances down the coast there is no landing unless 

 one has the attributes of a cat — sheer precipices of 

 one or more hundred feet, cut here and there by deep 

 caiions, while spouts, falls, and cascades of water 

 abound during the winter rains. The Mosquito Caiion 

 is called "Mosquito" because it is a solid rock and the 

 water stands in a series of basins — encouragement to 

 the few melancholy mosquitoes supposed to live here. 



We could often hear high in air the cry of a young 

 goat, and the answer; and near the summit — now 

 lost by the fog flecks, now in the bright sunlight — 

 we could see the stalwart forms of big bucks standing 

 monarchs of their pinnacles, looking down at the human 

 pygmies a thousand feet below. The goat-hunters 

 were now Gifford Pinchot and Stewart Edward White. 

 This day I followed them up with a double-barrelled, 

 hard-kicking camera, which had a fatal propensity to 

 try to take two or three pictures on the same film, — 

 a bad habit for a kodak, productive of more or less 

 keen and passionate criticism, not to say invective. 



