THE HORNED ANIMALS— MOUNTAIN ANTELOPES. 



509 



stones; for they are accustomed to it in the moun- 

 tains. Even the report of a gun does not always 

 excite their attention; but when once Chamois rec- 

 ognize the sound and know what it portends, they 

 hurriedly scamper off. In many cases, however, the 

 report perplexes them and the sportsman has an op- 

 portunity of sending another shot at them. This 

 may be partly explained by the fact that even a Man 

 often finds it very difficult, on account of the echoes 

 in mountain regions, to judge from what direction a 

 shot was fired or whether the noise was produced 

 by the report of a gun or only by concussion of a 

 rolling stone dashing against a boulder. The sense 

 of sight of the Chamois is undoubtedly efficient at 

 long distances, but does not enable them to distin- 

 guish enemies who remain quietly under cover. 

 Like most other animals they do not seem to recog- 

 nize an enemy in a quiet human being, and see in 

 him an object of fear only when he moves. 



The Chamois a Towards the middle of November, 

 Courageous, Pugna- the strong bucks join the flocks and 



cious Animal. remain with them for two or three 

 weeks. Taciturn and silent as they are during the 

 remainder of the year, they then exercise their voices, 

 emitting a dull, hollow bellow or grunt, hard to be 

 described. At the appearing of the old males the 

 young bucks disperse in alarm; old warriors, how- 

 ever, that encounter each other in a flock, always 

 refuse to retreat, and at once enter into combat, a 

 strong buck never tolerating the presence of another 

 one in his flock, even if the latter consists of thirty 

 or forty females. The little Chamois appear during 

 the last days of May or at the beginning of June. 

 Old does sometimes have two, or even three, young 

 at a birth; young does only one. 

 Infancy and Train- The young kids are lovely little 



ing of Cham- creatures with a thick woolly coat 

 ois Kids. f a p a [ e fallow red hue; they follow 



their mothers everywhere and in a very few days 

 display the same agility as is possessed by older 

 animals. The does treat them with the greatest 

 maternal tenderness for at least six months, exercis- 

 ing great vigilance in their behalf and teaching them 

 all that is necessary to enable them to fill their mis- 

 sion in life. The mother guides her offspring with 

 a bleat, bearing a slight resemblance to that of a 

 Goat; she teaches them to climb and jump, and 

 sometimes executes some leap for that purpose a 

 great many times, until they can accomplish it them- 

 selves. The kids are sincerely, attached to their 

 mother and do not, while they are young, desert her 

 even in death. Their growth is very rapid, for, as 

 Kobell, who is well versed in these matters, says, 

 they are the only animals which suffer compara- 

 tively little from the severe weather of winter. They 

 still find some food on the steep rocky precipices 

 from which the snow is usually blown away, or 

 under the shelter of rocks and trees, which keep it 

 away to some extent, while Deer are driven into the 

 valleys and, if not fed by man artificially, frequently 

 succumb. 

 Food of the Cham- In summer the Chamois feeds on the 



ois in Summer best and most succulent of Alpine 

 and Winter. herbs, especially on those which 

 grow near the snow line, and also on tender young 

 shoots of the bushes and dwarf trees of that altitude, 

 its bill of fare ranging from the rose of the Alps to 

 the young seed cones of pines and firs. In late fall 

 and winter, however, it must content itself with the 

 long grass protruding above the snow, and with 

 moss and lichens. Salt seems to be an essential to 



its well being, as it is to most Ruminants; as to 

 water, however, it does not seem to need it and 

 probably quenches its thirst by licking the dewy 

 leaves. It is fastidious from choice and frugal from 

 necessity and rapidly increases in fat, bulk and 

 weight when it feeds on good food, but scanty fare 

 soon reduces it. Flocks of Chamois often gather 

 around the hay-ricks which are piled up in some 

 districts of the Alps, and they gradually eat such 

 deep holes or tunnels into the piles that they can 

 go into the hay to shelter themselves from the 

 storms. In other localities where such hay-ricks are 

 unknown, they accept no food from the hands of 

 Man even in the severest of weather of winter, but 

 suffer and pine. 



Winter for the Chamois not only implies great 

 scarcity of food, but it also menaces them with 

 avalanches, which sometimes bury entire flocks. 

 The animals know this danger and confine them- 

 selves to places where they are safest; but even then 

 their doom often overtakes them. Rolling masses 

 of earth and boulders also sometimes kill them; 

 diseases and epizootics thin their numbers, and an 

 array of foes, chief among which are the Lynx, 

 Wolf, Bear and Eagle, are constantly at their heels. 

 Lynxes lie in wait for them in the forests in winter, 

 and commit great ravages among them; Wolves fol- 

 low them, especially when the snow lies deep, and 

 Bears also inflict great losses on their ranks. In the 

 Engadine it is said to have happened that a Bear 

 pursued a Chamois into a village, in which the ani- 

 mal was saved by entering a barn. Eagles are no 

 less dangerous, as they swoop down on them as un- 

 expectedly as a flash of lightning coming from a 

 clear sky, take up a young kid without the least ado 

 and try to drag larger ones into some abyss, despite 

 their resistance. These assailants are, fortunately, 

 nearly extinct in all protected localities, but their 

 number is everywhere augmented by the most 

 deadly foe — Man — unless the government has estab- 

 lished definite hunting rules and customs which 

 warrant or tend to attain a regulated protection of 

 this noble game. 

 The Chamois a The hunting of the Chamois has 



Favorite Game ever been held to be a sport worthy 

 Animal. D f practice by the highest in the 

 land, and at the present day has become almost ex- 

 clusively a sport for princes. The greatest abun- 

 dance of Chamois are found in the game preserves 

 owned by the Emperor of Austria, the King of Ba- 

 varia, various archdukes and wealthy noblemen of 

 the Austro-Hungarian empire; they are guarded by 

 experienced forest guards, usually living right in 

 the midst of the hunting district, and therefore the 

 chase of the animals in these regions is both attract- 

 ive and generally rewarded with success. 



Von Kobell 's Ac- "A great deal has been written 

 count of a Chamois about the Chamois hunt," says 

 Hunt. Franz von Kobell, "and there are 



some people who have but barely seen a few hunts, 

 and yet have taken to writing and have, according 

 to their humor and the experiences of the expedi- 

 tions in which they have taken part, either made it 

 out to be the most dangerous of all sports or else 

 described it as if it were not more perilous than the 

 coursing of Hares or the chase of Deer. That this 

 hunt is more romantic than others, is implied by 

 the character of the scenery amidst which it must 

 occur, but as regards the perils of the hunter, they 

 depend upon the methods used and the conditions 

 surrounding the hunt. He who has hunted many 



