IN THE FAR WEST. 341 



rock or sombre canyons, where no ordinary enemy can follow 

 them without making- its presence known. 



When a sentinel detects the approach of a suspicious object 

 he sounds an alarm at once by a few loud and peremptory 

 hissing snorts j this brings the flock huddling together, the 

 ewes and lambs being in the centre, and when the column is 

 formed, all dash for the highest ridges at their best pace, and 

 never stop until they have sought a safe refuge amongst crags 

 or chasms. The advance is always led by a sturdy ram, one 

 that is generally looked upon as the leader, and the rear and 

 flanks are carefully guarded by the young males. When flocks 

 of old rams congregate together, which they always do after 

 the running season is over in December, the first one in an alarm 

 that moves off is the leader, and all the rest, like the domestic 

 sheep, follow him heedlessly, in a bunch, until a halt is made, 

 when sentinels are again posted, and the source whence danger 

 is expected is carefully watched. 



In regions even where they are little disturbed, they 

 raise their heads every few minutes while feeding, and 

 survey their surroundings; and as they are both sharp 

 of eye and keen of scent, it requires the most careful 

 stalking to approach them within shooting range without 

 being detected. They will get the scent of a hunter to the 

 windward seemingly half a mile away ; and when that terrify- 

 ing odour is made known to the flock they display the greatest 

 symptoms of terror, and dash wildly for the highest pinnacles, 

 now leaping nimbly from crag to crag or vaulting dark and 

 narrow chasms with the greatest ease, anon plunging head 

 foremost into precipices apparently deep enough to shatter 

 them into fragments should they strike the ground ; nor do 

 they stop until they have placed a goodly distance between them- 

 selves and their most dreaded foe. They hurl themselves from 

 giddy heights into the depths below with such readiness that 

 one is liable to give some credence to those tales related by red 

 and white hunters, which specify that they would prefer death 

 to an encounter with man ; and that their horns are so strong 

 and elastic that they can fall upon them on a crag several feet 

 below, and rebound to their feet none the worse for the con- 

 cussion. The latter statement may be taken with a large grain 



