2i 8 The Mountain Sheep 



doing this, I hastened to a new position. Where 

 I had been sitting she was bound to see me as 

 soon as she climbed twenty feet higher, and I 

 accordingly sought a propitious cover, and found 

 it in a clump of evergreens. She got to the wall 

 where she could make one leap of it. It was 

 done in a flash, and resembled nothing that any 

 well-to-do matron could perform ; but once at the 

 top, she was again the complete matron. She 

 scanned the new ground critically and with ap- 

 parent satisfaction at first. I stole the glasses to 

 my eyes and saw her closed lips wearing quite 

 the bland expression of a lady's that I know 

 when she has entered a room to make a call, and 

 finds the wall-paper and furniture reflect, on the 

 whole, favorably upon the lady of the house. 

 Meanwhile, the poor little lamb was vainly 

 springing at the wall ; the jump was too high 

 for it. Its front hoofs* just grazed the edge, and 

 back it would tumble to try again. Finally it 

 bleated; but the mother deemed this not a mo- 

 ment for indulgence. She gave not the slight- 

 est attention to the cry for assistance. There 

 was nothing dangerous about the place, no un- 

 reasonable hardship in getting the best of the 

 wall ; and by her own processes, whether you 



