MAMMALIA 21 



danger — at one time clambering on hands and feet up a 

 perpendicular precipice, at another crawling through a narrow 

 crevice between two high boulders ; now running across a 

 sea of stones, which gave way at every step and render it 

 impossible even to think of standing still ; now stepping from 

 ledge to ledge, and trusting one's life to the sturdy alpenstock 

 with which each one has armed himself before setting out. 

 The hounds meantime are clambering up with an agility 

 which would astonish their relations further south, resembling 

 a party of squirrels rather than members of the canine race, 

 as they vie with one another in their anxiety to be to the 

 fore. 



1 About an hour of this sort of work brought us to what was, 

 comparatively speaking, level ground, and here we for the first 

 time met with a check. The Mart had considered discretion 

 the better part of valour, and had taken refuge in a deep crevice 

 in the face of a rock. As the efforts of the terriers were of no 

 avail, artificial means were now brought into requisition in order 

 to dislodge the varmint. We all set to work to collect as much 

 grass as the locality afforded ; the huntsman produced from his 

 capacious pockets a box of matches, a little gunpowder, and an 

 old newspaper, and in a few minutes a fire which consisted of 

 smoke rather than flame was burning as far down the crevice as 

 the fuel could be thrust. We had not long to wait. All stood 

 back, and in less than three minutes a long dark object was seen 

 scampering over the rocks above our heads, having escaped out 

 of a hole a little distance off. 1 Away we went again, both 

 hounds and men more excited than ever, leaping from crag to 

 crag, and performing acrobatic feats from which any one would 

 have shrunk in cold blood. The ground now became of a rather 

 less difficult nature, and we were able, without imminent danger 

 of destruction, to take a glance at the surrounding scenery. The 

 rising sun had dispelled the mist, and the atmosphere had by 

 this time become quite clear, though a few clouds hung on the 

 summit of the higher peaks. From our elevated station we 



i Tobacco has sometimes been employed as fuel in lieu of grass and 

 heather. Occasionally the hunters ' rolled ' the ' Mart ' out of its hiding- 

 place with fragments of rock. 



