Mountain Sheep. 2 37 



angle. After following this for a few hundred yards, we 

 turned a sharp corner, and shortly afterward our eyes 

 were caught by some grains of fresh earth lying on the 

 snow in front of our feet. On the sides, some feet above 

 our heads, were marks in the snow which a moment's 

 glance showed us had been made by a couple of mountain 

 sheep that had come down one side of the gorge and had 

 leaped across to the other, their sharp toes going through 

 the thin snow and displacing the earth that had fallen to the 

 bottom. The tracks had evidently been made just before 

 we rounded the corner, and as we had been advancing 

 noiselessly on the snow with the wind in our favor, we 

 knew that the animals could have no suspicion of our 

 presence. They had gone up the cliff on our right, but as 

 that on our left was much lower, and running for some 

 distance parallel to the other, we concluded that by running 

 along its top we would be most certain to get a good shot. 

 Clambering instantly up the steep side, digging my hands 

 and feet into the loose snow, and grasping at every little 

 rock or frozen projection, I reached the top ; and then ran 

 forward along the ridge a few paces, crouching behind the 

 masses of queerly-shaped sandstone ; and saw, about 

 ninety yards off across the ravine, a couple of mountain 

 rams. The one with the largest horns was broadside 

 toward me, his sturdy, massive form outlined clearly 

 against the sky, as he stood on the crest of the ridge. I 

 dropped on my knee, raising the rifle as I did so ; for a 

 second he did not quite make me out, turning his head 

 half round to look. I held the sight fairly on the point 

 just behind his shoulder and pulled the trigger. At the 



