THE MOUNTAIN goat 



115 



on one occasion an individual whose "partner" 

 had been shot deliberately sat down, dog-like, 

 thirty yards away and watched the hunter skin 

 and cook a portion of his mate. In Idaho two 

 miners killed a large Mountain Goat with an axe. 

 While exploring in Alaska, unarmed, a member 

 of the United States Geological Survey was once 

 vigorously attacked by an old male goat, which 

 attempted to drive him from a narrow mountain 

 path. 



The White Goat is quite as odd in appearance 

 as in mind and habit. Judging merely from its 

 appearance an observer would be justified in 

 considering it a slow, clumsy creature, safe only 

 upon level ground. Instead of being so, it is 

 the most expert and daring rock-climber of all 

 American hoofed animals. Its hoofs are small, 

 angular and very compact, and consist of an 

 ingenious combination of rubber-pad inside and 

 knife-edge outside, to hold the owner equally 

 well on snow, ice or bare rock. 



Professor L. L. Dyche declares that Mountain 

 Goats will cross walls of rock which neither man, 

 dog nor mountain sheep would dare attempt to 

 pass. He has seen them cross the face of a preci- 

 pice of apparently smooth rock, to all appearances 

 entirely devoid of ledges or shelves of any kind, 

 and so nearly perpendicular that it seemed an 

 impossibility for any creature with hoofs to 

 maintain a footing upon it. And yet, the goats 

 not only passed safely across, but they did it 

 with perfect composure, frequently looking back, 

 and turning around whenever they saw fit to do 

 so. 



In general outline this animal has the form of 

 a pigmy American bison, and were its pelage 

 dark brown instead of pure white, the external 

 resemblance would indeed be striking. It has 

 high shoulders, low hind-quarters, stocky legs, 

 a thick-set body, and shaggy pelage. Its head 

 is carried low, the crown seldom rising above 

 the upper line of the shoulders arid back, and the 

 face is too long for beauty. The horns are so 

 small, short and severely plain they are neither 

 beautiful nor imposing. 



The weight of this animal is about that of the 

 Virginia deer. The shoulder height of a good 

 average size male is 37 inches, length of head and 

 body, 6G inches, tail, 4 inches, and girth 51 inches 

 (L. L. Dyche). The females average about one- 

 fourth smaller. Except in length and color of 



pelage the Mountain Goat is clad after the style 

 of the musk-ox. Next to the skin it wears a 

 dense coat of fine wool, through and far beyond 

 which grows a long, outside thatch of coarse hair. 

 When free from dirt, both these coats are yellow- 

 ish-white, and contain no patches of color. Be- 

 hind each horn is a peculiar bare patch of black, 

 oily skin, the size of a half-dollar. The horns 

 are small, smooth, very sharp-pointed, jet black, 

 and the longest on record measure 11^ inches. 

 The cannon bone is proportionately the shortest 

 to be found in any large ungulate. 



Professor Dyche thinks this animal is not 

 likely to be exterminated very soon, chiefly be- 

 cause of its inaccessibility, its lack of beauty as 

 a trophy, and the expenditure of time, money 

 and muscle that is necessary to win within gun- 

 shot of it. Its flesh is so musky and dry that it 

 is not palatable to white men save when they 

 are exceedingly hungry, and its skin has no com- 

 mercial value. Nevertheless, in the United 

 States, the White Goat has been so much sought 

 by sportsmen and others who like difficult hunt- 

 ing that now it is found only in Washington, 

 Idaho and northwestern Montana. Northward 

 of our boundary, it is scattered very thinly, and 

 at long intervals, throughout British Columbia 

 and Alaska as far as the head of Cook Inlet. 



In 1900 a new species was discovered on Cop- 

 per River, Alaska, and named Kennedy's 

 Mountain Goat. It is marked very plainly by 

 horns that are no longer, but are more slender, 

 more strongly ringed, and spread farther at the 

 tips than those of the original species. 



Up to the year 1903, only four white goats 

 had ever been exhibited alive in the United 

 States east of the Rocky Mountains. Of these, 

 two were shown at Boston in 1899, and two are 

 now alive in the Philadelphia Zoological Gar- 

 dens. As might be expected, it is a difficult mat- 

 ter to keep such creatures alive and in good health 

 on the Atlantic coast. In 1902 a very fine adult 

 male specimen was on exhibition in the London 

 Gardens. 



PRONG-HORNED ANTELOPE FAMILY. 



Antilocapridae. 



This unique Family of one species and one 

 subspecies, must not be confused nor in any way 

 connected with the large and important group of 

 African antelopes, which contains a grand array 



