314 SHORT STALKS 



had droj)ped his head and crept away like a snake in the 

 grass. Achmet's beUef in the penetration of my weapon 

 was such that 1 could not convince him that it was useless 

 for me to try and shoot him in the head through the top 

 of the ridge. 8ucli was my share in the tantalising dis- 

 appointments of our quest, but I felt that, in spite of my 

 tw^o bad shots, had we had the slightest turn of luck, we 

 should have secured grand heads of what must, I think, 

 be the most beautiful deer in the world." 



Disheartened by our failures, we felt that we must 

 try some range where the forest was less dense, and 

 the conditions more favourable to success. Such a one 

 we believed we knew of in the Emir Daoh. Bouba 

 had visited it in the early spring. He had seen deer 

 there, and, as a proof, had brought back some horns. 

 It took us four days to reach it, for our pack train con- 

 tained some sorry animals. Alfred, who knows a good 

 horse when he sees it, was mounted on one which had 

 seen twenty -three summers, each of which had left its 

 scars on its knees or elsewhere. Then there were all the 

 other delays which arise in a country where procrastina- 

 tion is the rule of life. The Turks have a saying which 

 aptly expresses their attitude towards any one in a huny. 

 " Let us put it under the cushion of the divan," equiva- 

 lent to the Parliamentary expression — " that it do lie on 

 the table." 



Our wa}' lay along a chain of elevated plains, Hanked 

 l)y l)arren mountains, and separated from one another by 

 low rocky passes. It followed, for the most part, one of 

 the ancient trade routes to Konia. C*amels pass all day 

 in long strings, grunting under their loads, as they have 



