Mountain Goat 
rather humped and head carried below their level, nose hairy, 
a short beard on the chin. Horns slender in both sexes and 
curving slightly backward, black, as are also the hoofs. 
Range. Higher Rocky and Cascade Mountains to Alaska. 
The higher, almost inaccessible slopes of the British Columbian 
Mountains are the stronghold of the mountain goats. There usually 
above the timber-line, amid the wildest scenery, and surrounded by 
glaciers and precipices they live practically unmolested except by the 
insatiable hunters. Living in such isolation they are in little need of 
speed or agility and are said to be rather slow and stupid beasts, easily 
secured if the surroundings admit of an approach. 
The mountain goat presents many points of interest. In the 
first place it is not a goat but rather an outlying member of the great 
antelope tribe—to which by the way our American ‘‘antelope” does 
not belong. The nearest relatives of the goat are the serow of the 
Himalayas and the chamois of the Alps, though the long fleecy coat 
and goat-like beard give it a very different aspect. 
In colour too it is peculiar, being the only pure white ruminant 
animal known; this is an excellent protection, rendering it practically 
invisible during the snows of winter, though at other seasons it would 
seem to render it equally conspicuous. 
In describing his experience in pursuit of this animal Frederic 
Irland writes: ‘‘ The most charming innocent creatures that I met 
in the Cascade Mountains were the white goats. What do you 
think of a wild animal which, after he knows you are on_ his 
track, will stop and turn back, to peer around the corner and see 
what you are? These stately animals, with their long white aprons, 
coal black eyes, and sharp little horns, really seem to me too 
unsophisticated to shoot. At Ashcroft and Lillooet people had told 
me to get my hand in by shooting a goat and then perhaps I 
could improve by getting a sheep. As usual we were seeking what 
we might destroy, though as a fact we let many chances go. 
We had nearly burst our hearts by climbing for an hour or two 
up the mansard roof of North America and high above the deer 
pasture. The winter on the mountain tops had driven the game 
down and sent the bears to their winter dens. We had found 
sheep tracks and were following along to see where they led, 
when suddenly we saw four white animals on the edge of an 
abyss of the kind which Doré has portrayed in illustrating Dante. 
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