“We haven't made up our minds yet,” answered Harry, “and from present appearances we are not likely to at once. We went to look at a flock of sheep and concluded from what we knew of the habits of the animal that they would have a hard time to exist if they were outside the care of man. We don't know much about the argali either in Asia or America, but if he is no more intelligent than the sheep he would not be able to elude the hunters as he does.”
“You are quite right,” said their mentor, “as the argali far surpasses the sheep in intelligence and activity. The argali is graceful in figure, wonderfully sure of foot, his vision and heaving are of the keenest, and when there is any danger near he is always on the alert to discover it. Read what a hunter say of the Ovis montana or Rocky Mountain sheep,” he continued, as he opened the pages of a book entitled “Sporting Adventures in the Far West,” by J. Mortimer Murphy.
George took the book and read as follows:
“Few creatures are more difficult of approach than the big-horn, for, like all mountain animals, it is exceedingly keen of scent, unusually vigilant, and so cautious that it carefully reconnoitres a country from an elevated stand-point ere it presumes to advance toward it. The Nimrod who would place the head of the big-horn among his trophies of the chase, must be not only of an active and vigorous form to bear steep mountain climbing and a rarefied atmosphere, but he must also possess the qualities of patience, perseverance and hardihood, for its pursuit may lead him through deep and gloomy precipices, and over ground so stony and rough as to seem impassable.
