“Ah, to be sure—yes,” said the old lawyer. “What! an eagle’s nest?”
“And there goes the eagle,” cried Lawrence, pointing, as a huge bird swept by them high up on rigid wing, seeming to glide here and there without the slightest effort. “That’s an eagle, is it not, Mr Preston?”
“A very near relative, I should say,” replied the professor. “The lammergeier, as they call it in the Alpine regions. Yes, it must be. What a magnificent bird!”
“We shall see more and finer ones, I daresay,” said Yussuf! quietly; “but the time is passing, excellencies. We have a long journey before us, and I should like to see the better half of a difficult way mastered before mid-day.”
Their guide’s advice was always so good that they continued their slow progress, the baggage-horses ruling the rate at which they were able to proceed; and for the next hour they went on ascending and zigzagging alone; the rugged mountain track, with defile and gorge and ridge of rock rising fold upon fold, making their path increase in grandeur at every turn, till they were in one of nature’s wildest fastnesses, and with the air perceptibly brisker and more keen.
All at once, just as they had turned into the entrance to one of the most savage-looking denies they had yet seen, Yussuf pointed to a distant pile of rock and said sharply:
“Look, there is an animal you may journey for days without seeing. Take the glass, effendi Lawrence, and say what it is.”
The lad checked his pony, adjusted his glass, an example followed by the professor, while Mr Burne indulged himself with a pinch of snuff.
“A goat,” cried Lawrence, as he got the animal into the field of the glass, and saw it standing erect upon the summit of the rock, and gazing away from them— “A goat! And what fine horns?”
“An ibex, Lawrence, my boy. Goat-like if you like. Ah, there he goes. How easily they take alarm.”