184 IN MALAY FORESTS. 



other goats had probably collected there, and I made 

 my own way to the point where we had ascended the 

 hill. After a considerable interval my brother and 

 W. came up, and the beaters straggled in close behind 

 them. Neither of the other guns had seen or heard a 

 goat, and both heartily condemned the proceedings as 

 a failure. One of the beaters, a brother of Hussein, 

 had, however, come upon a goat which had refused to 

 give way to him. His story, which is quite worthy of 

 belief, was that he was making his way up the steep 

 side of the hill when this goat stood in his path and 

 refused to let him come any farther. It stood still in 

 one place facing him, shaking its head at him as if 

 about to charge, and stamping the ground with its 

 hoofs. Discretion was the Malay's only policy, and 

 he wisely retreated and sought another path. 



The beaters all spoke to fresh goat tracks on all 

 sides, and their explanation of the ill-success of the 

 drive was that paths made by the goats led in every 

 direction. The goats on the western extremity, where 

 our drive had been, could make their way to the 

 eastern peak without passing near any of the three 

 stations we had taken up ; they could skirt along the 

 hill above or below the precipices on the outer side of 

 it, or they could contour the inner side of the central 

 basin. There was no means of driving them in any 

 particular direction, and that a goat should pass any 

 given point was purely a matter of chance. 



After a thorough discussion, during which various 

 plans and theories were suggested, we finished our 

 cigarettes and made our way back down the hill to 

 Hussein's house. 



