WITH THE COUGAR HOUNDS 47 



also fell to the rear, as he always did when the scent was 

 hot, and Jim and the bitches were left to do the running 

 by themselves. In the gathering gloom we galloped 

 along the main divide, my horse once falling on a slip- 

 pery sidehill, as I followed headlong after Goff whose 

 riding was like the driving of the son of Nimshi. The 

 last vestige of sunlight disappeared, but the full moon 

 was well up in the heavens when we came to a long spur, 

 leading off to the right for two or three miles, beyond 

 which we did not think the chase could have gone. It 

 had long run out of hearing. Making our way down the 

 rough and broken crest of this spur, we finally heard 

 far off the clamorous baying which told us that the 

 hounds had their quarry at bay. We did not have the 

 fighters with us, as they were still under the weather from 

 the results of their encounter in the cave. 



As it afterward appeared, the cougars had run three 

 miles before the dogs overtook them, making their way 

 up, down and along such difficult cliffs that the pack had 

 to keep going round. The female then went up a tree, 

 while the pack followed the male. He would not climb a 

 tree and came to bay on the edge of a cliff. A couple of 

 hundred yards from the spot, we left the horses and 

 scrambled along on foot, guided by the furious clamor 

 of the pack. When we reached them, the cougar had 

 gone along the face of the cliff, most of the dogs could 

 not see him, and it was some time before we could make 

 him out ourselves. Then I got up quite close. Although 

 the moonlight was bright I could not see the sights of 

 my rifle, and fired a little too far back. The bullet, how- 



