Krag t the Kootenay Ram 



Scotty, plunging around in his attempt, alarmed 

 them more and more, and they put forth all the 

 strength of their feeble limbs in the effort to 

 go to their mothers. The man slipping and 

 scrambling' after them was unable to catch 

 either, although more than once he touched 

 one with his hand. But very soon this serious 

 game of tag was adroitly steered by the timid 

 mothers away from the lupine bed, and once on 

 the smooth, firmer ground, the Lambs got an 

 advantage that quite offset the weariness they 

 began to feel ; and Scotty, plunging and chasing 

 first this way and then that, did not realize that 

 the whole thing was being managed by the old 

 ones, till they reached the lowest spur of the 

 Gunder Peak, a ragged, broken, rocky cliff, up 

 which the mothers bounded. Then the little 

 ones felt a new power, just as a young Duck 

 must when first he drops in the water. Their 

 little black rubber hoofs gripped the slippery 

 rocks as no man's foot can do it, and they 

 soared on their new-found mountain wings, up 

 and away, till led by their mothers out of sight. 

 It was well for them that Scotty had laid 

 aside his rifle, for a Sheep at a hundred yards 



22 



