94 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



come against his shoulder, and then drawing them 

 back he endeavours in this way to inflict a wound. 

 Among the many stories related of the chamois, it 

 was said that they made use of their crooked horns 

 to let themselves down by, in places where descent by 

 other means was impossible. Ridiculous as the tale is, 

 many believed it ; but of such hereafter. 



The food of these animals consists of the herbs 

 found on the mountains, and the buds and young 

 sprouts of the alpine rose and the latschen. This is 

 their sole sustenance; no creature therefore is more 

 innoxious than the chamois, and the wholesale destruc- 

 tion of them which has taken place since 1848 cannot 

 even be excused on the plea that, like the red-deer, they 

 occasionally tread down and injure the crops of the 

 husbandman. They keep to their rocks, delighting in 

 the highest and most inaccessible places ; and it is only 

 when winter sets in with all its rigour, that they de- 

 scend to seek shelter and food in the woods somewhat 

 lower down the mountain. At this season they feed 

 on such grass and leaves as they can find, and probably 

 also on the Iceland moss, which is met with on the 

 mountains. In their stomach a hard dark-coloured 

 ball is often found, bitter to the taste, but of an agree- 

 able smell : this is called Bezoar, and owes its forma- 

 tion to the fibrous, resinous nature of the substances 

 on which the chamois feeds. 



The rutting season begins in November. At this 

 period a sort of bladder forms beneath the skin at 

 the root of the buck's horns, the lymph within which 



