206 SHORT STALKS 



assisted l3y siuTOiinding conditions. Not only are these 

 rocivs cut up into innumerable clefts and ravines, but they 

 are covered by a tliin forest of stone pines, noble trees of a 

 pale green colour, not mean and disbranched like those of 

 Italy, but driving great wedges of root into the rocks, and 

 spreading like Scotch firs into lofty and massive trees of 

 varied outline. Between them a shorter and denser growth 

 of cypress and deciduous barberry, now dying oft* in scarlet 

 and orange. This covert, though not quite continuous, 

 made hiding for the ibex very easy. Nor was this all. 

 The rock is a kind of pudding-stone, and the round em- 

 bedded pebbles constantly work out and lie in unstable 

 banks, wherever the angle of solid rock admits of it. The 

 least touch, and down they clatter, starting others. Dur- 

 ino- the first fortnioht the drouoht and heat were excessive. 

 This not only drove the animals to the innermost recesses 

 for coolness, liut made the stones more resonant ; and the 

 air being dead still, the least noise travelled far. Even the 

 fallen oak-leaves ^ were so crisp and dry that they crackled 

 like parchment. Like all animals that live in good covert, 

 these goats have great confidence in its protection, and 

 we saw them more often near the foot of the clift', within 

 hearing of the drovers on the highway, than at a higher 

 elevation. The best which I secured I killed within easy 

 shouting distance of the railway. 



But this confidence is accompanied by exceeding 

 watchfulness, and their natural alertness is indefinitely 

 increased by the constant harrying of the natives. The 



1 According*to Herodotus, " The Phocians were made aware of the apjiroach 

 of the Persians on the mountain-path to TliermopyLo by the noise of tlie 

 oak-leaves as they were trampled by the soldiers in the stillness of dawn." 



