4 THE SNOW PARTRIDGE. 



preparatory to an avalanche ; you have to mind your feet ; it is 

 impossible to say which is more slippery, the stones or moss, and 

 a single false step would shoot you some two or three 

 thousand feet into the birch trees below ; but the whistle bursts 

 out, not fifty yards away, with redoubled energy, echoing 

 harshly amongst the crags. You push on, half sliding, to a little 

 plateau close to where the whistles sounded ; you scrutinize 

 intently the purplish grey stones in front ; you cough, raise 

 your gun ; still nothing is to be seen. But the dog's eyes, 

 as he stands (his chain held by a Pahari) shivering with excite- 

 ment, are almost starting from his head ; a look to the man, 

 and the old smooth-haired, liver-coloured setter (ah ! dear compa- 

 nion of many, many happy days!) is sneaking forward, almost 

 like a prowling cat ; but only for a few paces — then he stands 

 immoveable. Again you wait ; a few steps only — and the foot- 

 hold may be such that firing would be impossible ; a Pahari 

 heaves a big stone a few yards in front of the dog's nose ; 

 presto ! as if by one impulse, in one lump, with the clatter of a 

 hundred Partridges, up springs a covey ; they rise perpendicu- 

 larly about three yards, and your first barrel rakes them, dropping 

 three ; the second catches the hindermost bird as they sweep 

 down the hill-side. The first three lie amongst the rocks, the 

 last first touches ground five hundred feet below. But there 

 is no time to think of him. Before the echoes of the shots have 

 died away, a growl, as if of anger at being disturbed, at first 

 low, but growing louder every second, floats down from the 

 peaks above ; a rolling cloud, a confused mist of snow, in which 

 a few black specs are discernable, is coming straight down on 

 you. You reach the birds, when, with a surging swish and mighty 

 clatter, down rushes the avalanche, stray fragments of stone 

 striking, and the skirts of the snow sweeping, even the little 

 plateau whence you fired. A near thing, but the birds have 

 been marked down less than a quarter of a mile ahead, a little 

 higher and in much better ground than that where you found 

 them ; and sending a man and dog down to recover the bird 

 below, you push on recklessly over ground that, at other times, 

 you would cross at a snail's pace, until again the harsh whistle 

 warns you that the game is at hand. And now, if you have 

 luck, you will get, within the space of two hundred yards, from 

 three to six as fine shots, singles and doubles, as ever gladdened 

 the heart of sportsman ; and even if you cannot follow this 

 covey up a third time, you may probably, if you are in one 

 of their head-quarters, find another, and another ; and besides 

 picking off three or four Snow Cocks with a rifle, and possibly 

 (because all the firing in the world will not at times prevent 

 such suddenly cropping up before you) a Tahr or a Burrel, you 

 may take ten to fifteen brace of these splendid Snow Partridges 

 down with you to your camp in the forest below. A few days 

 later, discussing some of these (cooked gipsy fashion) beside 



