THE GAME OF THE HIGH PEAKS: THE WHITE GOAT ^5 



guard when the other halted to browse. The sun had just set ; it was 

 impossible to advance across the open plain, which they scanned at every 

 glance ; and to skirt it and climb up any other place than the pass down 

 which I had come itself a goat- trail would have taken till long after 

 nightfall. All that I could do was to stay where I was and watch them, 

 until in the dark I slipped off unobserved and made the best of my way to 

 camp, resolved to hunt them up on the morrow. 



Shortly after noon next day we were at the terrace, having approached 

 with the greatest caution, and only after a minute examination, with the 

 field-glasses, of all the neighboring mountain. I wore moccasins, so as to 

 make no noise. We soon found that one of the trails was evidently regu- 

 larly traveled, probably every evening, and we determined to lie in wait by 

 it, so as either to catch the animals as they came down to feed, or else to 

 mark them if they got out on some open spot on the terraces where they 

 could be stalked. As an ambush we chose a ledge in the cliff below a ter- 

 race, with, in front, a breastwork of the natural rock some five feet high. 

 It was perhaps fifty yards from the trail. I hid myself on this ledge, 

 having arranged on the rock breastwork a few pine branches through 

 which to fire, and waited, hour after hour, continually scanning the moun- 

 tain carefully with the glasses. There was very little life. Occasionally a 

 chickaree or chipmunk scurried out from among the trunks of the great 

 pines to pick up the cones which he had previously bitten off from the 

 upper branches ; a noisy Clarke's crow clung for some time in the top of a 

 hemlock; and occasionally flocks of cross-bill went by, with swift undula- 

 ting flight and low calls. From time to time I peeped cautiously over the 

 pine branches on the breastwork ; and the last time I did this I suddenly 

 saw two goats, that had come noiselessly down, standing motionless 

 directly opposite to me, their suspicions evidently aroused by something. 

 I gently shoved the rifle over one of the boughs ; the largest goat turned 

 its head sharply round to look, as it stood quartering to me, and the bul- 

 let went fairly through the lungs. Both animals promptly ran off along 

 the terrace, and I raced after them in my moccasins, skirting the edge of the 

 cliff, where there were no trees or bushes. As I made no noise and could 

 run very swiftly on the bare cliff edge, I succeeded in coming out into the 

 first little glade, or break, in the terrace at the same time that the goats 

 did. The first to come out of the bushes was the big one I had shot at, 

 an old she, as it turned out ; while the other, a yearling ram, followed. 

 The big one turned to look at me as she mounted a fallen tree that lay 

 across a chasm-like rent in the terrace ; the light red frothy blood covered 

 her muzzle, and I paid no further heed to her as she slowly walked along 

 the log, but bent my attention towards the yearling, which was galloping 



