However, I was satisfied that he was unhurt, and the wounded one probably lay between us and him, so that I at once took up the search for the beast, the man on the hill coming in now very handily, directing us by a prearranged code of signals.
Presently this man (Dewanna) got very excited and kept signalling ‘below, below.’ As we were then at the bottom of the valley we were at a loss to know how to go any lower, when out from behind a large boulder came the Poli, very sick indeed; but to make sure I gave him another barrel and rushed up to gloat over my latest prize, measuring 59 ins. along the left and 58½ ins. along the right horn.
I then started up hill back to where the first one lay. On getting up to him I was rather disappointed, as I had thought that he was bigger than his comrade, and I pulled out the tape and began to measure: ‘sixty, sixty-one, two, two and a half’—thank goodness, at last I had got a trophy that would hold its own in any company, and one that will still be a comfort, a joy, and a thing of beauty when old Time has so stiffened my joints as to make this most glorious and exciting of all sports only a memory for me.[26]
Having skinned our beasts and packed their heads upon one pony, the younger Kirghiz, careless of the possibility of a fall and consequent impalement, twisted himself somehow in among the twisted horns on the pony’s back, and so, he riding and we on foot, we turned towards camp, warned by the waning glories of the sky, the dark shadows stealthily creeping across the snows, and the little rills frozen into silence, that the Night King was coming, and that it was well to hurry. As we reached camp our interpreter met us, and I think everyone echoed his ‘Vraiment, c’est assez grand!’ as my first big head was scrutinised.
In 1888 we had wandered about until we found the valley in which the above took place, and then having discovered a good hunting ground sat down to work, with the satisfactory result of fifteen rams bagged, all but four being over 50 ins. and several the right side of 60 ins.
In 1890 we decided to try the Southern Pamir, as all the natives agreed that the further south you went the bigger the heads became. But a visit to the Southern Pamir meant much more elaborate preparation than heretofore, and our modest little caravan of twelve horses all told in 1888 swelled to the considerable number of forty in 1890; for it was not only necessary to take food for ourselves and our men, but also for the animals, and for each horse carrying a load of baggage we had to have an extra horse carrying barley to feed him. Besides this we took four or five horseloads of firewood, for there are long stretches of the Pamir that are absolutely devoid of vegetation of any kind—places where even the travellers ‘stand by’ for fuel, ‘Boortsa eurotia,’ is not to be found. Without boortsa life on the high timberless plateaux of Central Asia is indeed hard, for that insignificant-looking plant affords splendid fuel. Green or dry it makes a blazing fire, and though it wants constant attention and soon burns out, where there is no dry dung it is a perfect god-send.
We had made up our minds not to return by Turkestan if we could get across the Hindu Kush, and down into India; but as our chance of getting through was very uncertain, we were obliged to secure our retreat by establishing depôts along the return route, of barley, flour, firewood, &c., all of which entailed extra transport.
We found our tent, though it was lined and had a double fly, so cold and so troublesome to keep upright during the furious gales which even in summer sweep over the Pamir, that on our second expedition we took with us a couple of Kirghiz yourts in addition to this tent, and although the yourts are not fastened to the ground in any way, yet, owing to their being dome-shaped, they never showed the slightest tendency to blow over. Once inside our yourt, a stormy evening had no fears for us, nor had we ever to rush out in scanty garments on a bitter night to refasten some yielding tent-peg.
On the Abchur Pamir there were immense quantities of Poli horns, most of them of very large size, one head which I measured being 69 ins., though even this was beaten by one which was shown to me at Simla by Sir Frederick Roberts, who kindly allowed me to photograph it. The head was given to Sir Frederick Roberts by the Maharajah of Kashmir, and is as far as I know the biggest head on record—length, 75 ins.; tip to tip, 54½ ins.; circumference round the base, 16 ins.