EXORCISING AN EVIL SPIRIT. 67 



on 10 burning stuff that he informed me was a charm with 

 vliich he was endeavouring to exorcise the evil spirit he 

 liought must have possessed it — for, he added, he never 

 i;i(l known it behave so badly when he had been out with 

 no on former shikar trips. The following morning, how- 

 \vv, my eye being considerably better, such ideas were dis- 

 )clled from their minds by my shooting a fine buck tahr, 

 lid also a gooral. The tahr was one of a herd of seven ; 

 tut owing to the broken nature of the ground, it was not 

 iilil after we had stalked quite close up to and shot him, 

 hat we caught sight of his companions as they scurried 

 ;elter-skelter away among the rocks. My satisfaction at 

 luiiig, at last, able to kill some game on this ground, was 

 dded to by the opportunity it afforded of providing my 

 Tiends of the plateau with some venison in return for 

 'heir civility. 



The game here had been so much disturbed by my wild 

 iring, that I now thought it advisable to try fresh ground, 

 ^bout noon the loads were all packed and hauled up from 

 he rocky alcove. The laden men descended along the ridge 

 .ntil they reached the lower extremity, as it were, of the 

 mphitheatre, where the torrent that drained it rushed and 

 umbled down its rock-bound channel towards the narrow 

 orge we had, a few days before, ascended with so much 

 ifficulty from the river Goree to the plateau. Kurbeer 

 nd I took a more circuitous route down through the crags 

 n the chance of finding game, but were unsuccessful. In 

 iie evening we found the camp pitched beside some huts 

 ear the stream, across which, and rising abruptly almost 

 rom the water's edge, was a very steep and rugged hill-face 

 ^e intended scaling on the morrow. 

 1^ In the early morning we crossed the stream and coni- 

 ' lenced the long and arduous ascent, which must have been 

 ome 5000 feet at least, and not a drop of water was there 

 3 be found on the way up. It was past mid-day ere we 

 11 had reached the top. The heat of the sun's rays, as 



