HUNTING-CAMPS ON HARDANGER YIDDEN. 197 
Then they started off on the serious business of feeding. 
Had they elected (as we were hoping) to continue their 
former course, along the base of the crags, the herd 
must have passed our position within long shot; but, 
instead, they held north, filing up a snow-filled couloir 
that led over the sky-line, several calves bleating maa! 
maa ! as they disappeared. We followed fast. Beyond 
was a deep basin. Here laggards lingering behind the 
herd delayed our advance full half-an-hour; thence, 
over the ridge, into another valley, with a lake filling 
its floor and a glacier blocking its extremity—a lovely 
spectacle as those forty agile deer skipped playfully across 
the icy barrier. Then a narrow “ pass ” to the left led 
out on to a boggy plateau—the final scene ! 
On reaching the crest of the pass, I observed the 
deer all scattered, feeding on the boggy flat below, 
many within seventy to a hundred yards, one big 
bull standing statuesque on a rock at three hundred. 
But the lowering sun was now direct in our eyes, glint¬ 
ing and obscuring detail; colour had vanished, and 
outlines were difficult to distinguish. The bull fed 
slowly, leisurely, towards us ; at intervals he halted for 
minutes at a time, rubbing his horns on the rocks or 
pretending to drink at the moss-pools. At length I 
recognized him for certain (by his one big back-tine), 
and decided to take the shot when next he showed his 
broadside. The distance was well over two hundred 
yards—probably two hundred and forty—and I rested 
the rifle over a flat rock, one of the semler (hinds), only 
sixty yards away, looking up as I got into position. 
For some seconds after the shot the bull stood still, 
and I thought he had it true, though I had felt the 
