8o BIG GAME SHOOTING 



a matter of life and death ; indeed, in the eyes of the Bavarian 

 keeper, his Tyrolese neighbour used to be regarded much in 

 the same light as the American frontiersman looks upon red- 

 skins, i.e. the only good Indian he knows is a dead Indian. 

 Chamois poachers are by no means to be placed on the same 

 low level as Bill Sikes or Tom Stubbs of evil mien, who sneak 

 about English preserves. The ' Freeshooters of the Alps,' as 

 they are often called, are invariably brave fellows, who literally 

 take their lives in their hands, and are not moved by mercenary 

 motives, but by their inborn love of the chase. As a rule, they 

 make the best and most faithful keepers ; experience in 

 hundreds of cases testifying to the correctness of the old 

 saying, that a good keeper is but a good poacher turned outside 

 in. No finer specimens of manhood can be discovered than 

 among such reformed and unreformed poachers, and most 

 of the great lords take pride in having the most dare-devil 

 fellows and best cragsmen as keepers. Their whole lives are 

 passed in the great silent solitudes of timber-line, and for weeks 

 at a time they don't see a human being, and undergo hardships 

 of which the ordinary dwellei in civilisation has no concep- 

 tion. 



The shooting season varies triflingly ; in some parts of the 

 Alps it begins in July, and ends in December, in others it 

 begins only in August. The rutting season is in November, 

 and that is the only time when old bucks are found constantly 

 mingling with the does. Were it not for the inclemencies of 

 the Alpine climate, which usually covers inhospitable timber- 

 line with several feet of snow by the end of October, the rutting 

 season would be the best for stalking, for chamois are then less 

 wary, and their coats have by that time got darker in colour, 

 and hence they are more easily seen than earlier in the season ; 

 but as a rule the chase is made impossible to all but the most 

 hardy by the deep snow. The interesting instantaneous photo- 

 graph taken of chamois during the rutting time shows how 

 dark their coats have got by that time. September and October 

 are as a rule the months chosen for driving and stalking. The 



