124 



SHORT STALKS 



which professes to give a description of the fauna of the 

 province, does not mention the aninicaL An accomplished 

 traveller told me that it was scarce, " Ijut not qnite so 

 difhenlt to get as an Algerian lion." A friend who had 

 travelled throuo-h the southern ranges of the Atlas admitted 

 that he had never heard of it. Can it be wondered at tliat 

 I desired to secure so rare a trophy, and incidentally to use 

 it as a peg upon v»diieli to hang a fresh series of experiences, 



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to wander among mountains rarely visited, to pitch or 

 strike my camp when and where I pleased, among a people 

 who daily do the same ? 



Our expedition began with some misfortunes. A great 

 Januarv storm in the Channel had 1)lown down some tele- 

 graph posts, and so delayed our arrival in Paris that we 

 missed the Marseilles express, and consecjuently the Algiers 

 boat. At Marseilles we received a telegraph from my dear 

 old chasseur Celestin, who, on his way to meet us there, 

 was seized l)y the fashionable complaint, and lay halfway 

 from his mountain valley, helpless as a log. He did not 



