222 SPORT IN EUROPE 



expedition in 1893, ^^^^^ on another shooting trip to Ceylon in 1894. 

 That morning- we started early from the hut. The Major had to 

 ascend a creek to get at a herd of chamois which had been seen 

 by the keepers at its distant head the previous day, while I, having 

 passed the ridge just beneath the glacier of Piz Torena, had to 

 shoot under the nearer summits, as I was suffering from a strain 

 in the knee from the year before, that prevented my going too far. 

 After I had for several hours skirted the mountain wall beneath the 

 summit, I saw through my glasses the Major, who, far below me, was 

 climbing the path up the valley. He signalled with his cap that there 

 were chamois on the rocks under me. I clambered down with 

 the guide, grasping tufts of grass to steady myself ; but after we 

 had advanced fifty yards or so I had to stop with my back to the 

 wall, letting the guide creep to the edge and peep over for any sign 

 of the chamois indicated by Ellis. While he was shaking his head, 

 the shrill whistle of a chamois froze my blood, for I thought I must 

 be discovered. Motionless I awaited the return of the ouide ; and 

 when he returned, we both saw a buck climbing the steep rocks, some 

 way above us and to our right. It was evidently the animal that 

 had sounded the alarm ; but as the wind was blowing from the 

 valley it could not possibly have scented us, and we therefore came 

 to the conclusion that it must have scented the Major, and that 

 it must in fact be the identical beast he had sionalled us about. 

 We remained motionless, scannino- it throuoh the olasses, when, 

 behold, another — a larger animal — appeared overhead on the snow, 

 which, evidently alarmed by the whistle of its comrade, was steadily 

 examining the cliffs and gulches of the mountain below him. After 



