194 SIBERIA 



rather troublesome to fix it. It had been blown 

 down during the day. That night the horses became 

 so frightened that they would not leave us, and came 

 quite close to the fire. The hunters said there were 

 wolves about, and the horses had evidently seen them. 

 iWolves or no wolves, it did not stop me from rolling 

 myself up in my fur coat and tumbling oflf to sleep. 



I slept until about 9 a.m., the following day being 

 given up to hunting the particularly wily ibex and 

 the wild sheep. Our hunt was fairly successful. The 

 ibex is a skilful climber, so that in order to stalk it 

 the himtsman requires, to bei a fairly good mountaineer 

 himself. These animals are exceedingly intelligent 

 and wary. Our arrival in the vicinity of their haunts 

 had caused them to withdraw fully two to three miles 

 from the camp, and our party had a long and weary 

 tramp before we got within stalking distance of one pr 

 two herds of them. Ultimately we discovered a 

 small herd on, a rocky ledge of one of the peaks . The 

 Kalmuck detected their presence long before the rest 

 of our party had the least idea of it, and, resting his 

 gun on the two sticks which were attached to it for 

 support, he fired, hitting one in the neck. It turned 

 over and fell to the bottom of the precipice. The 

 remainder of the herd made their escape, and, for 

 an hour or two, our prospects of securing anything to 

 take back with us appeared very doubtful. Shortly 

 afterwards, however, my interpreter and the two 

 hunters came across several" large ibex, each of which 

 received an ounce of lead too much. We returned 

 to the camp with our trophies and made a meal off 

 one of the ibex, which we fenjoyed exceedingly. Our 

 Kalmuck friend boiled the half of the animal for him- 

 self in a large black pan. I thought he would never 

 finish eating. I have never seen a man eat one 

 quarter of the quantity that Kalmuck could account 

 for, and probably never shall again, unless it is my 



