OLLEN AND OTHER HUNTING 277 



understand the word, obtained his sport, we were most 

 anxious to see the system of the thing in practice. 

 Keebeet told us that during one of these gais, or drives, 

 the Prince had shot eleven ibex in a morning. 



There seems little or no sense in battues of the kind, 

 with all the best elements of hunting left out. From 

 what we could gather they always selected well-known 

 plateaux and passes, upon which the beaters converged, 

 and the game was all to the man behind the rifle. 



Our host claimed to be an authority on the ways of 

 tur, and was busily compiling a sort of census of their 

 numbers and distribution. By unconsciously counting 

 up the same animals over and over again he had simply 

 thronged the country, on paper at least, with roving 

 bands of energetic and healthy specimens, all fitted out 

 with record heads. Gradually the census was evolving 

 into a book on Caucasian sport generally, very statisti- 

 cal and uniformly dull. 



" I tell you all the facts about shooting here," he 

 said, when we complained of the uninteresting scraps 

 we had to listen to. " Things you ought to know. 

 All that I do, no more." 



" But what a dull, unimaginative book it is going to 

 be, so unoriginal, too," quibbled Cecily. "We have so 

 many facty shooting books already. Aren't you going 

 to drape the ugly facts at all ? 



" I write what I see," replied the Prince stohdly. 



" Then your trouble will begin when you see what 

 you write," laughed my cousin audaciously. 



And he laughed too, good-humouredly, as an 

 Englishman would. It was not always thus, however. 



