142 SHOET STALKS 



who was accompanied 1)y Abdullah that day, scored the 



first success. Quite early in the day he spied, at the 



bottom of the corrie, the head of a moutlon sticking out 



of a l)ush. The animal was so bad to see that, when he 



took his ghiss off the spot, he could not refind him for a 



quarter of an hour. Soon after this he made out four 



others witli him. The approach was not very difficult if 



they could get over a certain space which had to be 



crossed in view. He himself went first, moving with 



extreme slowness and caution ; but when Aljdullah came 



to follow, the patience of that child of nature was not 



equal to the strain, and, when halfway across, he started 



up and ran the rest of the distance. The sheep of course 



saw him and moved to a far more impregnable position 



liioli up the opposite side. The hunters were, moreover, 



now fairly caught, being in full view, and there they had to 



stay for four hours till the sheep began to feed. They then 



slowly crept l)ack the way they had come, and, making a 



great circuit of the corrie, came down upon them from aljove, 



and 2'ot at leno-th within one hundred yards. There was a 



o'ood ram w^itli them, and Gerald thought he had picked out 



the very hair that he desired to hit. The beast, however, 



went oti" witli the others as if nothing had happened, and 



the runnino' shot, as usual, had no effect. Fortunately the 



hill was nearly bare in this part, and, as the ram followed 



the opposite face, he could be kept in sight. Seen through 



the glass, when he had run three hundred yards he showed 



signs of distress, and finally rolled over dead. The shot 



was exactly in the right place, having entered behind the 



shoulder and passed out at his throat ; but this animal 



also mioht well have been lost if the ground had not 



