9 2 SPORT AND TRAVEL 



sible that small blood-vessels cut by such a jagged- 

 edged bullet driven through them at an enormous 

 velocity immediately contract in such a way as to 

 prevent the haemorrhage which would result from a 

 cleaner wound? I would be content to regard my 

 very limited personal experience of want of blood 

 spoor, after wounding an animal with a .3O3-bore rifle, 

 as a mere accident, but I have heard similar com- 

 plaints in other quarters, and I therefore propound 

 a theory to account for it, which may or may not 

 hold water. This want of blood from a flesh-wound 

 is the one fault I have to find with the .3O3~bore rifle, 

 as its trajectory is very low, giving one a good chance 

 at ranges where the shooting would be very uncertain 

 with other rifles, whilst the wounds it inflicts are, if 

 anything, more severe than would be caused by a 

 45o-bore rifle with expanding bullet of the best 

 kind. 



I will now endeavour to bring my all too long 

 account of goat-hunting on the Maimun Dagh to a 

 speedy close. After cutting off the old ram's head 

 and giving it to Manoli to carry, I sent Mustapha 

 back to the camp with the carcass ; and the rest of 

 us then went on to the eagle's nest, and after a great 

 deal of trouble I at length became possessed of the 

 one egg which it contained. This was eventually 

 identified by my friend, Mr. John Young, the well- 

 known ornithologist, as that of a short-toed eagle 

 (Circdetus gallicus) a species widely distributed over 



