88 BIG GAME SHOOTING 



A sharp frost, causing a chilly mist to rise from the steaming 

 moorland surrounding the hut, however, sent me soon indoors 

 and to my night's quarters in the dry fragrant hay, where, 

 enfolded in a plaid, sleep after a twenty-five-mile walk was 

 indeed sound and restful. 



The following morning I was up before dawn, and after a 

 breakfast of a pannikin of steaming tea and some bacon, I 

 reached the first rocks at the base of the peak, before as much 

 as ' shooting light ' had chased away darkness. To be early 

 on the ground is a great advantage, for the chamois' day is 

 half over at what most people would consider a reasonable 

 breakfast hour, and moreover it usually gives the stalker the two 

 winds, i.e. the one ordinarily blowing down the mountain before 

 the rays of the rising sun strike the slope, and the one blowing 

 in the contrary direction after that has occurred. Leading up 

 to the rocks was an exceedingly steep grassy slope, which the 

 hard frost of the night had turned into a precipitous field of 

 ice, to ascend which my light pair of crampons (so useful for 

 rockwork in a limestone formation) came in very handy. On 

 reaching a good point of outlook a definite plan of action had 

 to be decided upon. As the wind would be soon drawing up 

 the slope, it became necessary to gain a point above the pro- 

 posed stalking ground, which could be done by climbing the 

 peak from the back. It was not of great altitude, perhaps some 

 two thousand five hundred or two thousand six hundred feet 

 over the moor where the Alp-hut stood, but the back rose in 

 bold proportions and presented a face almost bare of vegetation, 

 towering up like a huge wall, so that the task of scaling it from 

 that side was a stiff one. A couloir-like cleft running almost 

 vertically up the face of the rock offered the only practicable 

 means of ascending the first ninety or hundred feet, by a free 

 use of one's back and knees in chimney-sweeper's style. One's 

 progress would have been more rapid but for the rifle and 

 rucksack hampering one's movements. Protected, as the 

 muzzle of the rifle should always be when real climbing is to 

 be done, by a sheath of sole-leather five or six inches long 



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