Sierra de Credos 2 1 7 



disappearing in opposite directions so as to encompass both the 

 surrounding rock-ranges and to mark ibex in stalkable positions. 

 We awaited their return in camp, not only with anxiety, but with 

 some impatience, since the temperature had fallen so low that no 

 wraps or blankets served to keep us warm while inactive. 



After a fruitless search of four hours, the scouts returned ; no 

 better results attended a second morning and a third — nor our im- 

 patience. Clearly the second resource, that of " driving," must now 

 be tried. It was only ten o'clock that third morning, and already 

 the drivers, who had left at dawn so as to reach agreed positions 

 in case of the failure of resource No. 1, would be approaching the 

 fixed points four miles away on the encircling heights, whereat, by 

 signal, they would know whether to proceed with the " drive " or 

 to return by the circuitous route they had gone. Meanwdiile we 

 have ourselves to reach the " passes " in the heights above, and 

 the scramble and struoorle which that ascent involved we must 

 leave readers to imagine. Bertram gets through such work fairly 

 well, but the writer, a generation older, is fain to choose a lower 

 place, reputed a likely " pass." Here, after waiting an hour, we 

 descried the drivers sho wing-up at different points of those 

 encircling Riscos de Morezon, climbing like flies down perpen- 

 dicular faces, disappearing in gorges, and doing all that specialised 

 hunters can. But not an ibex came our way. When we reas- 

 sembled, it proved that three goats had been seen, one a ram. 

 Thus ended that day — cruel work amidst lovely though terrible 

 scenery — and never a wild-goat within our sight. 



On the morrow our selected positions were to be yet nearer 

 the heavens above than those of yesterday — along the highest sky- 

 lines of Gredos, between the Plaza de Almanzor and the Ameal. 

 From our camp my own post was pointed out, a niche in that 

 far-away impossible ridge. How long, I asked Ram6n, do 

 you imagine it will take me to reach it ? Our friends, who, lean 

 and lythe of frame, a specialised race of mountaineers, mock 

 mountain-heights and appreciate too little (though they recognise) 

 our relative weakness, reply, " Two hours." But at that precise 

 moment, while I yet scanned with binoculars the scene of this 

 supreme effort, examining in a species of horror that infinity of 

 piled rock-masses, their details cruelly developed in a blazing 

 sunlight, just then, across the field of the glass soared a single 

 lammergeyer. Now I know that these giant jjirds-of-prey span 



