200 CHAMOIS HUNTING. 



listening to, although they never began it ; but if you 

 spoke of them, their countenances betokened satisfac- 

 tion, and they would say perhaps, " Yes, all the gentle- 

 men like to go out with Maxl f or, " Xavier is a good 

 boy, and a good hunter too : he 's a sure shot, and has 

 won a prize this year at the great shooting-match." And 

 when Joseph brought home his richly-embroidered flag, 

 they were more pleased and prouder of it than if he 

 had bought each of them a bright kerchief or a boddice 

 worked with silver. 



" Nanny," said I, " you promised me a flower for my 

 hat, and you have not given me one yet." 



' ' Ah, ah ! because you cannot get one of the younger 

 sister you come to me; is not that it?" she said archly. 



" No indeed, my good girl, it is not so. It would, I 

 know, be useless for me to ask Marie to give me a flower, 

 though there is some one else, I think, who would not 

 ask in vain." 



" Well, V 11 see if I have one," she said ; and giving 

 her my green hat, she went to her own room, and soon 

 returned with a bright flower stuck jauntily beside the 

 tuft of hair from the throat of a stag and the downy 

 feathers that were already there — decorations in which 

 the mountaineer takes no little pride. 



Joseph, Berger, and myself now started, taking our 

 way through the meadows and long wooded slopes, all 

 dark, and solemn, and indistinct, despite the innume- 

 rable stars. We went towards the Miesing, and soon 

 after daybreak were already a good distance up the 

 mountain. Nothing was to be seen save a doe with her 

 kid. We crossed a field of snow, and Berger, creeping 

 forward to the ridge that overlooked a profound depth, 

 started back suddenly, exclaiming in a whisper, " There 

 are chamois !" They had seen him however, and were 



