SPORT IN THE HIGHLANDS 573 



and continued on foot up that most heart-breaking of 

 obstacles, a steep shale-slope. I was plodding along 

 very much in the same condition as the ponies when a 

 shout from my man made me look back. Following the 

 direction of his outstretched arm, I realized what a 

 fool I had been to attempt to approach a herd of sheep 

 already thoroughly alarmed, for there on the snowdrift, 

 silhouetted against the sky, at the very top of the divide, 

 were those mobile gulja. 



I had had enough of sheep-hunting for that day. 



Without bothering to recover the discarded horns, 

 which had no interest for me now that the equally fine 

 pair on a living specimen had for the second time given 

 me the slip, we hurried down to the camp. A good 

 meal, followed by a pipe, and warm blankets, soon put 

 a very different complexion on affairs, and I regretted 

 not having at least a photograph to show of that fine 

 pair of horns. 



As before, my trusty follower and the caravan bashi, 

 who alone knew the country thoroughly, arranged between 

 themselves the ground to which the camp should be 

 moved. As we started off once more in the crisp early 

 morning, the despondency of the previous evening had 

 given place to that thoroughly optimistic frame of mind 

 which is one of the chief requirements of a big-game 

 hunter, and alone enables the hardships and disappoint- 

 ments of this most fascinating of pursuits to be cheerfully 

 surmounted. Five herds of rams were seen that day, 

 numbering something like seventy beasts, but they had 

 all been thoroughly disturbed by the slowly moving herd 

 of cattle and noisy herdsmen, who had passed through 

 the very middle of this narrow strip of sheep ground, 

 causing them to retreat to their stronghold in the shale. 



