94 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



its pretty velvet ears, it will turn its head most know- 

 ingly on one side, and seem to cogitate on the meaning 

 of a flitting shadow ; and then, not from any fear, but 

 out of mere fun, will start away as though the shadow 

 were its playfellow and were running after it in sport. 



But I have seen others, of riper years even, diverting 

 themselves in the most fantastic manner. In the Hinter 

 Riss, at a spot called the Wechsel, I for a long time 

 watched the antics of a buck, who seemed to me to be 

 " sheer deleerit." He was in a hollow, on a large field 

 of snow, which he had all to himself. There he was 

 quite alone, and round and round he kept racing, like a 

 horse in an equestrian circus. Then he would turn and 

 go round in the opposite direction. Now he stopped, 

 pretending to attack some invisible enemy ; then look- 

 ing round astonished, bounded into the air, and off again 

 at his equestrian performances as before. How long he 

 continued at this game I do not know. I stayed looking 

 on for a good while, and he was still going on with it 

 when I went away. 



When chamois play such pranks as these, and jump 

 about " ganz wild und n'ar'sch," the mountaineers say it 

 is a prognostic of bad weather. 



A doe has generally but one kid at a time ; that she 

 should have two is however by no means of unfrequent 

 occurrence. The little creature at its birth is of a dark 

 brownish-yellow colour ; and when a day old is no longer 

 to be caught. 



There is perhaps no animal so peaceful and at the same 

 time so timid as the chamois. Nature therefore, besides 

 endowing it with a facility of climbing into the most in- 

 accessible places, and thus avoiding pursuit, has enabled 

 it to guard against the approach of danger by the great 

 acuteness of its senses of sight, smell, and hearing. It is 



