96 SPORT IN THE HIGHLANDS OF KASHMIR chap. 



not advance with sufficient caution, and let himself be 

 seen before he detected the markhor. I afterwards found 

 that this was. his principal defect as a shikari, and that he 

 was apt to fail in giving his employer a shot at a beast 

 that was unconscious of his presence. The second was 

 due to myself. I ought not to have fired when I did, 

 but should have sat still and waited. The markhor, 

 which had detected us, could not make us out, and would 

 presently have got up and given the alarm. The rest of 

 the herd would then have come out from concealment, 

 and stood about looking for the danger, and I should 

 have been able to pick out the best animal, for the whole 

 lot must have been in range from where I was, and if I 

 had waited I should almost certainly have done much 

 better. 



The following morning (the 21st) Zaru arrived with 

 the markhor's head, and I found to my great chagrin, 

 that the horns were only 25 inches, and the animal 

 should never have been shot. I was very vexed 

 with Abdulla, who should have known better than to 

 let me fire at so small a beast. That day we had 

 no luck. Shortly after leaving camp we sighted three 

 markhor, most probably the three we had lost the 

 previous evening. They were slowly going upwards, 

 apparently towards some precipitous rocks not far below 

 the crest, so we went by the track we had followed the 

 day before, in order to get above them and climb down. 

 This necessitated losing sight of them, but we marked 

 the rocks they were going for, and thought we could get 

 there all right. 



The climb down was worse than we anticipated, and 



