A SUMMER IN HIGH ASIA. 



that they all stopped lying there for some seconds, 

 while I took aim. I thought that I heard the bullet 

 tell ; but in a second they were up and over the 

 brow of the spur below them, and I fired my second 

 barrel at another as he disappeared, much as if I 

 had been shooting at a snipe with a gun. 



Springing up, I looked, and saw all four of them 

 careering away up the nalah untouched. My 

 feelings can be better imagined than described. I 

 had had a better chance at nyan than falls to the 

 lot of most men who have spent their lives in the 

 pursuit of Himalayan game, and had made a mess 

 of it. Salia at once set out on the tracks of the 

 herd. He persisted that both nyan had been hit, 

 while Saibra said that he had seen the first one 

 stagger before he was on his feet ; but I had 

 watched them going away at a gallop, and said 

 to myself they were either clean missed or only 

 grazed. However, it was not without a gleam of 

 hope that I ran down the slope to look at the 

 track where they had gone along the valley, and 

 I half expected to see blood. Not a drop ! and 

 I felt inclined to anathematise an unkind fate rather 

 than my own bad shooting (which, by-the-by, I 

 find is the usual impulse on like occasions). 

 Wearily I climbed up to Saibra, who had remained 

 on the spot from whence I had fired the shot, and 

 never did slope seem so steep or breathing so 

 difficult. But what is this ? He has a smiling face, 



and tells me that as he watched the disappearing 



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