IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 151 



glass in a kaleidoscope, and at that distance we 

 could hardly choose among them. It was fairly 

 safe, though, to pick out any dark-colored buck. I 

 rested the express carefully on the ridge, sighted, 

 and fired. The buck I had aimed at stopped short, 

 shot through the hind-quarters; the second barrel 

 sent him dashing off down the shale. The herd had 

 split up and were dashing off in every direction, 

 some tearing down the slope, starting small ava- 

 lanches of shale and rocks in their flight, others 

 making for the cliffs and scrambling up as only a 

 goat can climb. I was sitting astride the ridge now. 

 Kadera and Sidka had gone completely crazy with 

 excitement; they were pounding me on the back 

 and shouting: " Bara wallah, bara wallah, Sahib! 

 Maro !" (Big one, big one, Sahib ! Shoot !) 



Needless to say their exhortations made shooting 

 for the moment a physical impossibility, nor were 

 they conducive to perfect coolness on my part. I 

 seemed to see a regular kaleidoscope of "bara wal- 

 lahs" in every direction. Then I managed to calm 

 Kadera slightly, and taking the Winchester from 

 him, held it on a buck who was trying to scale what 

 appeared to be a perfectly sheer precipice to the left. 

 He would have got up it, too, if I had waited a mo- 

 ment longer, but the first shot brought him tum- 

 bling, and he fell sheer twenty yards quite dead. 



