Strangely enough they did not lie down on their sides, as do many hoofed animals, but doubled their forelegs under them, stretched their necks and hind legs straight out, and rested on their bellies. It was a most uncomfortable looking attitude, and the first time I saw an animal resting thus I thought it had been wounded, but both Mr. Heller and myself saw them repeatedly at other times, and realized that this was their natural position when asleep.
When frightened, like our own mountain sheep or goats, they would run a short distance and stop to look back. This was usually their undoing, for they offered excellent targets as they stood silhouetted against the sky. They were very difficult to see when lying down among the rocks, but our native hunters, who had most extraordinary eyesight, often would discover them when it was almost impossible for me to find them even with the field glasses. We never could be sure that there were no gorals on a mountain-side, for they were adepts at hiding, and made use of a bunch of grass or the smallest crevice in a rock to conceal themselves, and did it so completely that they seemed to have vanished from the earth.
Like all sheep and goats, they could climb about where it seemed impossible for any animal to move. I have seen a goral run down the face of a cliff which appeared to be almost perpendicular, and where the dogs dared not venture. As the animal landed on a projecting rock it would bounce off as though made of rubber, and leap eight or ten feet to a narrow ledge which did not seem large enough to support a rabbit.
The ability to travel down such precipitous cliffs is largely due to the animal's foot structure. Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn has investigated this matter in the mountain goat and as his remarks apply almost equally well to the goral, I cannot do better than quote them here:
The horny part of the foot surrounds only the extreme front. Behind this crescentic horn is a shallow concavity which gives the horny hoof a chance to get its hold. Both the main digits and the dewclaws terminate in black, rubber-like, rounded and expanded soles, which are of great service in securing a firm footing on the shelving rocks and narrow ledges on which the animal travels with such ease. This sole, Smith states, softens in the spring of the year, when the snow is leaving the ground, a fresh layer of the integument taking its place. The rubber-like balls with which the dewclaws are provided are by no means useless; they project back below the horny part of the hoof, and Mr. Smith has actually observed the young captive goats supporting themselves solely on their dewclaws on the edge of a roof. It is probable that they are similarly used on the rocks and precipices, since on a very narrow ledge they would serve favorably to alter the center of gravity by enabling the limb to be extended somewhat farther forward.[3]
[3] "Mountain Goat Hunting with the Camera," by Henry Fairfield Osborn. Reprinted from the tenth Annual Report of the New York Zoölogical Society, 1906, pp. 18-14.
There were certain trails leading over the hill slopes at Hui-yao which the gorals must have used continually, judging by the way in which these were worn. We also found much sign beneath overhanging rocks and on projecting ledges to indicate that these were definite resorts for numbers of the animals. Many which we saw were young or of varying ages running with the herds, and it was interesting to see how perfectly they had mastered the art of self-concealment even when hardly a year old. Although at Hui-yao almost all were on the east side of the river, they did not seem to be especially averse to water, and several times I watched wounded animals swim across the stream.
Gorals are splendid game animals, for the plucky little brutes inspire the sportsman with admiration, besides leading him over peaks which try his nerve to the utmost, and I number among the happiest hours of my life the wonderful hunts in Yün-nan, far above the clouds, at the edge of the snow.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE "WHITE WATER"