240 CRUISINGS IN THE CASCADES 



higher than any of them. He may toil on until he 

 is far above timber line, and is working his way 

 over and around vast drifts and beds of perpetual 

 snow and ice. Finally he sights his game a fine 

 handsome specimen standing fearlessly on some jut- 

 ting crag, deliberately feeding on some tender lichens 

 or, perhaps, peering proudly out over the lower 

 world. The hunter now changes his course until he 

 can conceal himself behind some neighboring rock, 

 and then crawls stealthily and cautiously up to 

 within rifle range of the game. Then, peering cau- 

 tiously from behind his cover, he takes careful aim 

 and fires. He is a dead shot and the rifle ball pierces 

 the heart of the quarry, but to his dismay it makes 

 a convulsive bound and down it goes over the preci- 

 pice, rebounding from crag to crag, until it finally 

 reaches a resting place hundreds of feet below. It 

 may go to where lie can never reach it, or may land 

 where he can recover it on bis return down the 

 mountain side; but if the latter, it may be torn to 

 fragments and scattered here and there until the 

 hide is useless, the horns are broken off, the skull 

 crushed so that the head is unfit to mount, and the 

 flesh so bruised and mangled that he can scarcely 

 save enough of it to make him a dinner. 



A few years ago an officer of the United States 

 army and a party of friends were hunting goats in 

 the Bitter Root Mountains, near Missoula, Mont. 

 They followed two a male and female to the top 

 of a rough and dangerous peak, when the game, 

 before they could get a shot at it, started down the 

 opposite side and took refuge from the hunters 

 under a shelving rock. Here it was, owing to the 



