I5 8 RANCH LIFE AND THE HUNTING-TRAIL 



the river just below our ranch, stopping to drink, and spending some time 

 on the sand-bars, occasionally playfully butting at each other. They 

 trotted off before they could be stalked. To get down to the river they 

 had to pass over a level plain half a mile wide ; and once across, they went 

 through a dense wood choked with underbrush for nearly half a mile 

 more before again coming to the steep bluffs. On another occasion, in 

 the rutting season, one of my cowboys encountered a mountain-ram cross- 

 ing a broad, level river-bottom at midday. Occasionally a ram will join a 

 flock of ewes, or a ewe and a yearling, in the spring. Two or three times 

 I have known them to come boldly up to the bluffs that overlook and 

 skirt a little frontier town, and there to stay grazing or resting for several 

 hours ; but they always made off in plenty of time to avoid the hunters 

 who finally went after them. Once 1 shot one within a few hundred yards 

 of my ranch house. I was returning home, weary and unsuccessful, after 

 a long day's tramp over hills where black-tail usually were common. 

 When nearly home I struck into a well-beaten cattle-trail, leading down 

 a deep, narrow ravine which cleft in two a knot of jagged hills ; it was a 

 favorite range for our horses, and so was frequently ridden over by the 

 cowboys. On turning round a corner of the ravine, a sudden snort to one 

 side and above me made me hastily look up, shifting my rifle from my 

 shoulder. On my right the sheer wall of clay rose up without a break for 

 perhaps two hundred feet or so, its thin, notched crest showing against 

 the sky-line as sharply as if cut with a knife; and on a little jutting pin- 

 nacle was perched a mountain sheep, its four hoofs all together on a space 

 no larger than the palms of a man's hands. It was facing me and staring 

 down at me, so that the bullet went right into its chest, splitting its heart 

 fairly open. Yet it did not fall forward over the cliff, but wheeled on its 

 haunches and went along the crest at a mad, plunging gallop, finally 

 crossing out of sight. Almost as soon as it disappeared a column of 

 dust rose from the other side of the ridge, making me think that it had 

 fallen some distance, striking hard on the dry clay. The guess was a 

 good one, and when, after a long circle and some climbing, I reached the 

 spot, I found a fine young barren ewe lying dead at the foot of a high 

 cut bank. 



But all such instances as these are wholly exceptional, and are chiefly 

 interesting as showing that mountain sheep act more erratically and less 

 according to rule than do most other kinds of game. They seem to have 

 fits of restless waywardness, or even of panic curiosity ; and so at times 

 wander into unlooked-for places, or betray a sudden heedlessness of dan- 

 gers against which they on ordinary occasions carefully guard. This last 



