A NATURALIST'S LABOURS. 189 



canon. With the crack of the rifle the old goat 

 pitched forwards and rolled down the slope, while 

 the kid hid behind some rocks. After waiting fully 

 five minutes for the kid to come out, the hunter 

 changed his position and the little fellow jumped 

 out and started to run. The gun cracked again, 

 and the kid went rolling down to join its mother. 

 It made a sheer fall of fifty feet. The skull was 

 crushed, the jaw broken in several places, the leg 

 and shoulder broken, the skin torn, and worst of all, 

 the horns were broken off and one lost. This almost 

 ruined the specimen, but Dyche spent twenty minutes 

 searching for the horn, and was fortunate enough to 

 find it. The kid was measured and skinned, and 

 then the search began for the old one. She had lodged 

 on a projecting ledge, and the naturalist was com- 

 pelled to work for some time to dislodge her. He was 

 finally compelled to get a long pole and make a lad- 

 der by which he got down to the goat, and here he 

 was compelled to tie himself to the rock to prevent 

 a fall while he worked over the specimen. Dyche 

 was so worn out that when he reached the foot of 

 the mountain he cached the specimens, and with only 

 a portion of the flesh of the kid he went on to camp. 

 He found, however, that the flesh, even of the kid, 

 was hardly fit to eat, for it was so permeated with 

 the musk of the glands that it was unpalatable. On 

 this trip Dyche was fortunate enough to find a spring 

 of pure water on the range, probably the only one on 

 the mountain, and this was always made the objec- 

 tive point of all trips hereafter. 



