THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN SHEEP. 145 



If you will watch an old ram going down a moun- 

 tain, you will see that he does not jump down steep 

 places, but is as careful as a dog about where he puts 

 his feet. He will feel his way down and slip and 

 slide, keeping a firm foot-hold all the time, and never 

 jumps any more than any other animal which ranges 

 the mountains. I suppose that the imagination of 

 some book hunter made the fearful leaps out of the 

 battered condition of the horns. He possibly could 

 not understand why nature wanted to put such horns 

 on an animal, and not knowing that the horns had 

 been battered up by fighting, he imagined that it 

 was done when the animal jumped and struck on its 

 head. 



" The horns of the males are of immense size, but 

 the ewes and lambs have small ones. Now, the 

 females and lambs have to jump and go where the 

 rams do, and if they jumped and struck on their horns 

 they would have a sorry time of it. The horns of 

 the males vary from twelve to eighteen inches at the 

 base, and a cross-section shows that they are all tri- 

 angular in shape. The horns and skull of the largest 

 sheep I ever saw weighed, when thoroughly dry, 

 twenty -eight pounds. The horns of the largest males 

 average from thirty to forty inches in length, while 

 those of the ewes are rarely over twelve inches 

 long." 



Early next morning the judge and the doctor 

 started over the trail to Thorp's ranch, leaving 

 Dyche practically alone in the mountains, for the 

 guide was no companion and took little interest in any- 

 thing beyond his immediate wants. The naturalist 



