52 CAMP-FIRES IN THE CANADIAN ROCKIES 



colored nearly every mountain-side in that region during 

 our September there. 



Below the fireweed, the ridges were dotted with 

 small, cone-shaped spruces, and trailing junipers (Juni- 

 perus prostrata), of the densest and richest green. The 

 grassy sides of the gullies were all pale yellow-green, 

 softly blended at the edges with the darker colors that 

 framed them in. At the bottom of each washout was a 

 mass of light-gray slide-rock, and above all this rare pat- 

 tern of soft colors loomed a lofty wall of naked carbon- 

 iferous limestone rock, gray, grim and forbidding. 



It seemed to me that I never elsewhere had seen 

 mountains so rich in colors as the ranges between the 

 Elk and the Bull in that particular September. 



The rain and the drifting clouds were with us for 

 one day only. Very early on the second morning, while 

 Mr. Phillips and I lay in our sleeping-bags considering 

 the grave question of getting or not getting up, Mack 

 Norboe's voice was heard outside, speaking low but to 

 the point: 



" Director, here's an old billy goat, lying right above 

 our camp ! " 



It was like twelve hundred volts. We tumbled out 

 of our bags, slipped on our shoes, and ran out. Sure 

 enough, a full-grown male goat was lying on the crest 

 of the divide that led up to the summit of Bald Moun- 

 tain, seventy-five feet above us, and not more than two 

 hundred and fifty yards away. The shooting of him was 

 left to me. 



I think I could have bagged that animal as he lay; 



