192 ON THE FEONTIEE. 



and shared it with Nip and Tug, at the same time caressing 



and making much of them. The dogs seemed quite proud 



of their prowess, and would every once and again take a 



walk round and a sniff at the dead wolf. 



Having refreshed myself, I soon skinned the coveted pelt 



off, and tied it and the recovered trap to my saddle. 



The skin was a splendid one. Before and since then I 



have seen several hundred gray mountain- wolf skins, but 



never such a large one as that was. 



On my return I found that Joe had gone after more 



meat, so busied myself with stretching and staking-out my 



trophy. 



Towards evening the hunter returned, bringing with him 



a fine ashlata. 



The ashlata has immense spiral horns, and short coarse 

 wool, closely approaching to hair in appearance, and his flesh 

 tastes very much like that of the original breed of Welsh 

 mountain-sheep ; but he is quite double their size. 



The specimen Joe brought to camp was the first 

 animal of the kind that had been killed by any of us that 

 season. We had frequently seen small flocks of them 

 upon the uppermost peaks and highest alps of the moun- 

 tains encircling the valley, but always in places so nearly, 

 if not quite, inaccessible, that we had been discouraged 

 attempting to obtain any of them. The flock out of which 

 Joe had at last got one had no doubt been driven down to 

 the comparatively speaking low ground in which he had 

 found them by the snow on the mountains, which near 

 their tops was lying so thick and deep that all feed was 

 buried completely out of reach. The ashlata was a fat 



