no BEAR SHOOTING 



offer a large mark, and my footing on the steep incline was 

 very uncertain. The animal rushed up twenty yards 

 farther, and stood again — this time giving a fair chance at 

 his rifjht side. I hit him in the root of the neck, and 

 nearly severed his head from his body ! Jamala rushed 

 up, made a gash in the wound, and said the animal had 

 been properly haUUed. Fresh meat, after a month of 

 tinned beef, was my first thought. The deer was a young 

 male, and had small musk pod ; his tusks were not long. 

 We then recrossed the Dabin stream, and camped at the 

 end of the spur that separates the upper valleys, then 

 went up the Chambil nullah, crossed the stream, and toiled 

 up the left hillside for a long way, but could find no trace 

 even of bears in any direction. It was half-past nine, and 

 I was thinking tenderly of breakfast, when the voice of 

 young Bruin was borne to us on the morning breeze, from 

 the far-off mountain slope in front and above. We all 

 cocked our ears and laid them to the welcome sound, like 

 so many hounds. We heard it distinctly three times, but 

 the faintness of the cry told us we had a long and toilsome 

 stalk before us. Young Bruin had, no doubt, lost sight of 

 his worthy mother, and by thus raising his voice betrayed 

 her. Sharafa searched the mountain sides in every direc- 

 tion with the glasses, but it was a long time before he 

 spied the mother and her young hopeful, very far away, 

 and very high up indeed. The stalk began at once, first 

 straight up hill for half a mile, then faster along the hill- 

 side, often a run, for a mile, and we were at last above the 

 family party, who were still over two hundred yards from 

 us. The wind was in the right quarter, and I had time 

 to recover breath, for tlie ground was so open that we 

 could not approach nearer without the certainty of being 

 seen at once, and we had to lie and watch them for a long 

 time. Mother Bruin sauntered off to a shady rock and 



