266 RESULT OF FORGETTING TO LOAD. 



and were gazing straight towards us. Presently one of 

 them went bounding and skipping away up the slope, 

 sometimes turning round for a few seconds to look back, 

 until he at length disappeared over its brow. His com- 

 panion continued to gaze ; but as we kept perfectly still, he 

 at last appeared to think that he must have been mistaken 

 in his suspicions, for he quietly turned round and began 

 feeding. In a short time, however, he became restless, and 

 after wistfully looking about him, as if he had suddenly 

 missed his companion, trotted off in the direction he had 

 gone, hardly stopping until his form appeared on the sky- 

 line at the top of the slope, and after a good look around 

 him, he too moved out of sight. 



Up we jumped and followed at our best pace, which, in 

 the thin air of an altitude of well over 16,000 feet, could 

 not be very fast, although the ascent was quite gentle. On 

 nearing the brow I made for some large stones, from behind 

 the cover of which to view the ground beyond, and at the 

 first glance had the satisfaction of seeing both the bucks 

 feeding within 130 yards of where I lay. Singling out 

 what I thought the better of the two, I luckily dropped him 

 in his tracks. The other sped off for a short distance and 

 then pulled up. If I hit him with the second barrel, as, 

 from the sound, I thought I had, it must have been too far 

 back in the body, for he galloped off and was lost to view in 

 a dip of the ground. Exchanging the empty Whitworth 

 rifle for another, a breech-loader, I followed after the buck, 

 and found him standing at the bottom of the hollow ; but 

 before I could get my aim he bounded off, though only to a 

 short distance, when he again stood and offered a fair broad- 

 side chance. I pressed the tricker click ! a bad cartridge, 

 thought I, and cocked the other hammer ; click ! again, and 

 away trotted the goa. I opened the breech and found 

 nothing but daylight in the barrels : dolt that I was, I had 

 forgotten to put in the cartridges. 



As the buck had taken a direction exactly opposite to the 



