136 A SPORTSMAN'S EDEN. 



efforts were made to kill them. In that neigh- 

 bourhood the animal had never been seen before. 

 The oldest inhabitant had never heard of a goat 

 on these hunting-grounds, and though in the 

 second year a few were killed by the young 

 braves out of curiosity, and as a lesson in natural 

 history, after that no one meddled with them, 

 the braves not caring about goafs-flesh, and, 

 unlike the braves of the civilized world, being 

 quite content with the ' scent ' with which Nature 

 had endowed them. So the goats increased and 

 multiplied, and when I pitched my tent at the 

 potato ranch on the evening of October 18th 

 or 19th (I forget which), I was assured that the 

 hill behind me was full of bearded billies and 

 their dames. It was starlight when we rose 

 next morning, and as we sat by the camp-fire 

 breakfasting and watching the light of a new day 

 spread over the precipitous face of rock opposite 

 to us, Toma and myself exclaimed simultaneously 

 in various languages : ' By Jove, there is one !' 

 and when the glasses were brought to bear, we 

 found that not one but three of the beasts we 

 sought were slowly browsing across what looked 

 to us a sheer wall of rock. Old S. was for im- 

 mediate pursuit. Toma and I dissented, long 

 experience having taught us both that when you 

 can see a beast from your camp-fire, the odds are 



