"Round Timber Line 
Part III. 
With Rifle and Pack Train in the Canadian 
Rockies —Goat Impressions—Their 
Habits and Vitality 
By R. B. HAMILTON 
T HAT the goat, as ordinarily accounted, is 
so stupid that very few things, will scare 
him, we found to be untrue, as the 
two days we . put in following our successful 
hunt, showed the mountain to be free of them. 
There were certainly at least eighteen goats on 
the mountain the first day, probably more. The 
second day’s hat'd hunting showed us only three 
goats and these on the retreat. I took a shot, at 
one of them at over 500 yards, but my bullet 
struck just above him. The third day, after a 
very strenuous climb up and over the ridge op¬ 
posite camp, we were only favored with a view 
of one goat in the far distance. We returned 
to camp early, therefore, and hastily packing, 
headed again for Bridge River, stopping at our 
camp on Gunn Creek Lake to pick up the things 
left there. 
During the latter half of our trip, that is, after 
we got into goat country, I do not think a day 
passed without our seeing at least one goat. All 
told we saw sixty-three of these strange animals, 
not counting those seen more than once, and yet 
Bill and Bonaparte agreed regretfully that “goats 
are getting scarce.” A few years ago, they say, 
ten might be seen where one now is. Of course 
this is true of other game as well. Bill’s hunt¬ 
ing experience extends over some thirty-five 
years, and his tales of the amount of game in 
this district twenty years ago are almost unbe¬ 
lievable. Mule deer, for instance, used to be so 
thick along the benches of the Fraser that a 
hundred might be seen at one time. However, 
to one used to' hunting moose and other big 
game, one sight of which is considered ample 
reward for a hard trip, there still seem to be 
lots of goats in the mountains. Of course the 
distance at which they are visible often disap¬ 
points one with the knowledge that game may 
be seen that is hopelessly beyond reach. For in¬ 
stance one frequently sees from the top of a 
mountain goats feeding on the side of another 
mountain, only a few miles away as the crow 
flies, but only to be reached by several days’ hard 
travel. 
Our Rocky Mountain goat is surely one of the 
strangest and most interesting of our big game, 
and so> little has been written of him that few 
have more than the haziest of ideas regarding 
him. Nearly everyone interested in outdoor life 
can at least recognize the picture of a moose, an 
elk or a bear, but it is surprising how few have 
ASCENDING BRIDGE RIVER. 
any idea what a mountain goat looks like, or how 
he differs from a mountain sheep. 
There have been a very few good books writ¬ 
ten about him, such as Dr. Hornaday's “Camp¬ 
fires in the Canadian Rockies,” the illustrations 
in which are also a liberal education, but com¬ 
paratively few are fortunate enough to possess, 
or have access to them. My own knowledge was 
rather vague until I began to read up the sub¬ 
ject six months before my hunt. I found many 
of my pre-conceived ideas about goats quite 
wrong, and I also came to differ in some opin¬ 
ions with those held by most of the mountain 
men, hunters and prospectors. 
In appearance the Rocky Mountain goat is so 
strange, so bizarre, that he is almost comical. 
Imagine an animal shaped like a miniature buf- 
falb, standing almost forty inches high at the 
shoulder, having a profile like a caricature of an 
Irish alderman, Dinny-gaw whiskers and all, with 
a blanket of long pure white fur- thrown over 
him and draped half way down his legs. He 
certainly does not look much like the common 
or garden variety of goat. He carries his head 
lower than his shoulders and has quite a notice- 
aide shoulder hump as well as a lesser hump on 
his hindquarters, due to the thickness of the 
hair there. His whole appearance gives an im¬ 
pression of massiveness and strength, and this 
is borne out in his actions. His coat is, in Sep¬ 
tember at least, pure white, and without spot or 
stain. Indeed, it always looks as if freshly 
combed and cleaned. The pelage is soft and 
thick as to undercoat, with a raincoat of longer, 
coarser hair that gives it a shaggy appearance. 
This extends down to the knees and makes him 
look as if he wore chaps. The beard in the fall 
is six inches long or more. His legs are short 
and .stocky, with big hoofs, and his dew-claws 
are large. The average goat looks very well fed 
and fat, although they always impressed me with 
the idea that they were unduly narrow and tall 
in proportion to their massive side view, as if 
built to walk along narrow ledges against the 
face of cliffs. This is undoubtedly due to the 
long, shaggy coats, as when skinned they are 
very round-barreled. 
His horns are smooth and round and sharp as 
a needle. They are jet black and curved slightly 
back, and the terminal portion, representing the 
first year’s growth, is perfectly smooth. Below 
this is a series of slightly raised rings, each j 
making a year of his age. The horns are not 
long, ranging from seven to ten inches, the record 
being eleven and a half inches and from an inch [ 
and a quarter to an inch and three-quarters in 
diameter at the base. These horns make horri¬ 
bly efficient weapons on the head of an angry 
billy. One quick upward thrust will skewer the 
boldest enemy, and a twitch of the powerful 
neck muscles will send him flying over the edge 
of the precipice that is nearly always handy in 
