146 The Wilderness Hunter 



where the camp was ; but, as so often happens in the 

 wilderness, we had not reckoned aright, having 

 passed over one mountain spur too many, and en- 

 tered the ravines of an entirely different watercourse- 

 system. In consequence we became entangled in a 

 network of hills and valleys, making circle after 

 circle to find our bearings; and we only reached 

 camp after twelve hours' tiresome tramp without 

 food. 



On another occasion I shot a white goat while it 

 was in a very curious and characteristic attitude. 

 I was hunting, again with an old mountain man as 

 my sole companion, among the high mountains of 

 the Kootenai country, near the border of Montana 

 and British Columbia. We had left our main camp, 

 pitched by the brink of the river, and were strug- 

 gling wearily on foot through the tangled forest and 

 over the precipitous mountains, carrying on our 

 backs light packs, consisting of a little food and 

 two or three indispensable utensils, wrapped in our 

 blankets. One day we came to the foot of a great 

 chain of bare rocks, and climbed laboriously to its 

 crest, up cliff after cliff, some of which were almost 

 perpendicular. Swarming round certain of the rock 

 shoulders, crossing an occasional sheer chasm, and 

 in many places clinging to steep, smooth walls by 

 but slight holds, we reached the top. The climbing 

 at such a height was excessively fatiguing; more- 

 over, it was in places difficult and even dangerous. 



