94 IBEX SHOOTING 



friend ! On the third morning the ibex 

 did not return to the fort, but took up their 

 post in another place. We made a tre- 

 mendous detour and came to where they 

 should have been. We had started from 

 camp at five a.m., and got level with their 

 grazing-ground at nine ; we watched them 

 go to their look-out post at ten, and then 

 climbed hard till three. Our rage can be 

 imagined when, on looking over the cliff, 

 we found that they were not there, but 

 back in their fort once more, about a mile 

 off. I was sick with rage and disappoint- 

 ment. Luckily we had ordered our bed- 

 ding to be brought half-way up the hill, so 

 as to save us part of our climb ; therefore 

 we had not so very far to go back, and had 

 no occasion to hurry home while it was light. 

 Our herd soon afterwards left the "fort," 

 and heading right away in quite a different 

 direction, quitted this portion of the moun- 

 tain, and went over into quite another 

 valley two miles off. So we went to rest 

 under a rock, arranged to have a final try 



