86 MAEKHOR. 



the trigger, aiming high, as he appeared to be over 200 yards away, across 

 a gully and below me. I missed, and he turned up hill quite leisurely, not 

 being able to discern where the shot was from ; I fired two more shots, 

 with no better result, as he clambered up a steep bit of conglomerate. I 

 then asked my man if he had seen where my shots had gone, and he said 

 high over the animal. I tried another, but he did not appear to be hit ; 

 then another, and finally my sixth and last, I vowed. Then my man said 

 he was hit, and that I should give him a finisher. I saw he was bagged, 

 tottering on the ledge, over which he fell plump, plump, about 50ft., and 

 then rolled and bumped down into the head of the gorge. I guessed his 

 horns were smashed, and so it soon proved, the right being broken short 

 off about Gin. above his head. I sent the native to " hallal " him, and 

 made my way round and down to camp, whence I sent the other men to 

 bring in the beast. They were not long over it, and I soon was scanning 

 the head ; very thick horns, but small, about 32in., with one broken and 

 the piece missing. I then turned to the carcase and found I had hit three 

 times; one (my fourth shot, I believe) in the shoulder, another cut the 

 inside of the hind leg and removed one testicle clean, the third cut the 

 brisket through, just behind the fore legs ! Having aimed low, I conclude 

 these latter wounds were my fifth and sixth shots. Next morning I 

 recovered the missing horn amongst some snow and junipers. I was 

 awoke at night by the extreme cold, and finally by a heavy snowstorm 

 coming on, which covered my bedding as I lay under the rock. It came 

 down heavily for a short time, and we were unable to move out in the 

 morning until it had melted somewhat. My goojur was down with fever 

 and headache from the exposure the evening before, so I had to content 

 myself with a robust coolie, but did nothing that day. We were again 

 awoke by the cold at nig'ht, in a goojur's hut below, and were snowed up 

 in it all day, but succeeded in getting down to camp by dark, after some 

 nasty shaves through tumbles on the slippery, melting snow. It was 

 frightfully cold to the feet, and rheumatism gave me awful twinges in the 

 right knee ; however, I adopted the natives' remedy, saturating rny knee 

 in bears' grease, and was able to get out again on the morrow. 



Soon after dawn we tackled a nullah to the south-west, leading up to 

 the ridge, and it was a real stiff climb. We saw some small inarkhor 

 only, and at dark reached camp under a friendly cliff, flushing a good 

 many Koklas pheasants in its vicinity. 



Next morning, after the usual early breakfast, we went up the cliff, 

 another very stiff climb, on to the ridge top ; here we turned along to the 

 east, found tracks and heard stones rolling down from time to time, but 

 could not get sight of any game, on the extremely steep cliffs. About 

 noon the goojur spotted two inarkhor lying under a pine tree a long way 

 below, on the end of a moraine, where it fell over into the valley below. 

 They were 500 yards away, and the ground was bad for a stalk, being 

 steep and smooth with snow. We had to commence by crossing an open 

 space, in full view of the inarkhor if they had been looking our way, up 



