The Wild Goats and Sheep of Dardistan 79 



hunter's excitement in securing new trophies, and 

 I verily believe that as much could be written 

 about the vagaries of markhors' horns as has been 

 written on antler lore in Europe. The tendency 

 has been to divide markhor up into all sorts of 

 sub-varieties, based on the different types of 

 horns Pir Panjal, Astor, Gilgit, Suleiman, and 

 so on. For the sportsman such names are con- 

 venient by which to mark the various shapes. 

 For instance, when I recently read in * The Field ' 

 that my friend Captain Barstow had secured the 

 shot record of heads by bagging a " Pir Panjal " 

 markhor carrying horns of 60J inches in a Gilgit 

 nullah, I knew exactly what type of head this 

 magnificent specimen must be, though the de- 

 scription as it stands is of course absurd. The 

 fact is, that in Dardistan are found almost all 

 kinds of heads, varying from the extreme lyrate 

 to the straight type, and it follows that all dis- 

 tinctions based on the supposition that each 

 locality has its own fixed type must vanish. 

 The conclusion that there is only one variety 

 of markhor is further borne out by occasional 

 curly-horned markhor having been seen in Kurram 

 and Baluchistan, districts commonly supposed to 

 produce the straight-horned variety only. In the 

 latter district the markhor is believed to have 

 crossed with the Persian ibex (jEgragus), and 



