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CHAPTEE XY. 



A SOLITAIRE. 



I HAD been chamois - shooting nearly a month, and 

 yet could not show a really good buck's head. As 

 is well known to sportsmen, the good bucks never 

 consort with the herds except in the rutting season ; 

 and the best of them go quite alone, from which habit 

 they derive the name of solitaire. According to their 

 habitat, they are called gratbock- — in other words, a 

 buck that lives among the cliffs — and latschenhock, 

 one which lies in the woods nearest the snow. Old 

 foresters will assure you that this distinction divides 

 two totally different varieties of animal, which, of 

 course, is not the case, though the chamois that 

 haunt the woods (and there are herds that have 

 this habit) are larger and finer than those of the 

 rocks. This, however, proves nothing ; nor is the 

 distinction so marked as it is between those of dif- 

 ferent districts. Greatly superior as is the Swiss 

 gams to the izzard of the Pyrenees, it is surpassed 

 in weight and horn measurement by those of Austria, 

 while, again, these must yield to the noble bucks of 

 Montenegro, Herzegovina, and the Caucasus. Like 

 the red deer, the farther east it is found the bigger 

 it is. 



On the day of which I am about to speak I decided 



