THE MOUNTAIN SHEEP 
Owing to the structure of their feet, the exterior and interior line of each 
hoof being perfectly straight, with the toes bevelled on the inside, mountain 
sheep are able to maintain a footing in places where man is unable to 
follow. The hoof catches the rock like a blade of shears and so they are 
able to stand and run in places where even a deer could find no foothold. 
It is a wonderful sight to see a flock of wild sheep pass along the side of 
a cliff with apparently nothing to hold on by, and there is no visible trail. 
You see them come to a perpendicular wall and think that now they must 
be stopped. The old leading ewe only lowers her head, hesitates a moment 
and takes a leap on to some slight excrescence which the human eye cannot 
detect, and again bounds off it to another small projection until she finds 
a way. No yawning chasm or dizzy precipice daunts her, because she 
knows, by frequent excursions along their innumerable trails, that there 
is a way. Each member of the flock seems to accept her leadership without 
question and to imitate her movements, so that they all travel over the 
very worst places as if actuated by one impulse. Of course, they do make 
mistakes sometimes. I know of one case where the skeletons and skulls 
of ten rams, all over 40 inches, were found lying together beneath a preci- 
pice in Montana. These probably met their death through some mistake 
on the part of the leader, but, on the other hand, they may have been 
swept off their feet by an avalanche. Four of these heads now find their 
resting place in the museum of a friend of mine in Sussex, and they are 
noble examples of old-time rams. 
It is a well-known fact that these highly -intelligent animals do some- 
times get themselves into impossible situations from which they cannot 
retreat, and more than one hunter has cornered them in some hopeless 
blind alley and been able to pick his heads; but such occurrences are dis- 
tinctly rare; and the man who expects to secure a head except after severe 
toil will generally be disappointed. The bighorn possesses a powerful 
scent, though not perhaps so strong as that of wapiti; but if they are in 
numbers and the wind favourable it is not difficult to detect the warm 
sheep smell. Horses and dogs are quickly aware of their presence. 
Whilst on the subject of dogs, it may be noted that a hound with good 
feet may be used with great effect in sheep hunting, provided that the 
country is not too rocky. One hunter I know of in the Lillooet region for years 
used a pair of collies and killed a great number of rams with them. His 
methods were simple. If the ram was in a position favourable for a stalk, 
he stalked it, but if he missed it, or the country was open and the sheep 
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