Ae, 
MISCELLANEOUS NOTES, 547 
very often erratic little currents of air, quite independent of the general 
direction of the wind, My misgivings turned out to be only too well founded ; 
just as we were finishing the stalk I felt a puff of wind on my back, and the 
poli immediately appeared cantering up hill, I had a chance of taking a long 
shot at the big ram as he stopped for an instant, but refused it. 
** Nothing under a certainty,” was my fixed resolve. After this we gave 
the big poli what Rakhmat called ‘‘ three days’ leave’’ and employed the time 
in searching other ground, but without finding anything shootable, though I 
picked up and measured an old ibex head of 5lin, 
On the fourth day we went otf to look for our poli again, expecting to find 
them almost immediately, After a few minutes’ work with the glasses 
I found a single beast grazing below one of the glaciers: this, however, on 
closer inspection, turned out to be only an ibex, and we searched all the usual 
places for the poli without finding them, Thinking they might be up at the 
head of one of the branch nullas, we were proceeding up it when suddenly I 
caught sight of a suspicious-looking speck high upon the sky line on the 
other side of the nulla. One look through the glasses was enough, and I 
sank to the ground, the shikaris at once following my example. It was the 
big ram. Though a long way off, his horns showed up splendidly against the 
sky and looked magnificent. Luckily, he was not looking etraight down 
below, and had not spotted us. He was soon joined by the rest of the flock 
and after standing, looking in all directions fora long time, they lay down 
where they were. We were in rather an awkward position, as the place we 
were on was in full view of the poli, and there was a good 100 yards to go 
before we could get to the nearest cover. True, we were a long way off, but 
they were evidently on the alert,and I had learnt from experience how 
keen-sighted they could be. There was no good stopping where we were, as 
the rams were almost certain to come further in our direction on getting up, 
and we should then be hopelessly stuck. Putting the glasses on the 
flock, of which only the heads of three rams were now visible, I started 
Rakhmat off, with instructions to crawl for the cover, to avoid crossing any 
patches of snow, and to stop instantly ona whistle from me, Off he went, 
and managed to reach cover without the poli stirring, As soon as he got 
there I started off the Kirghiz, but before he had covered 20 yards a ram got 
up and stared in our direction, anda whistle from me stopped him, After 
looking towards us for some time, the ram lay down again with his back 
towards us, and on a sign from me the Kirghiz re-commenced his crawl, At last 
he, too, was safely under cover, and, signing to Rakhmat to watch the flock 
with his telescope, I started off, The going was most laborious, over 
sharp stones most of the way, varied by occasional patches of freshly-thawed 
mud, Iwas halted by Rakhmat three or four times, but managed to join 
the shikaris without alarming the poli. Shortly afterwards they got up and, 
as I had expected, began to come down in our direction, If only the wind 
