From Fraser's Magazine.
CHAMOIS HUNTING.
I had been staying at Fend (one of the highest inhabited spots in Europe) for some days, existing on a light and wholesome regimen of hard-boiled eggs, harder baked rye bread, and corn brandy, exploring the magnificent scenery round me, and had returned the way I came, to a collection of brown packing-boxes, by courtesy called a village, which rejoiced in the euphonious name of Dumpfen, nestling cozily under the grand belt of pines that feathered the flanks of the mountains, which rose high and clear behind. In front roared, rattled, and grated, a wide glacier torrent, the color of ill-made gruel, and on the opposite side stretched, some quarter of a mile, a flat plain of gravel and worn boulders, here and there gemmed with patches of short sweet turf, till it reached the base of a noble range of cliffs, which rose gray and steep into the clear blue sky, so lofty, that the fringe of world-old pines along their summits could scarcely be distinguished.
On the narrow patch of turf between the village and the torrent I found—it being a fine Sunday afternoon—much mirth and conviviality. The rifle-butts were pitched on the opposite side of the torrent, with a small hut close to them to shelter the marker, a fellow of infinite fun, attired in bright scarlet, and a fantastic cap, who placed marked pegs into the bullet-holes, and pantomimed with insane gestures of admiration, contempt, astonishment, or derision, the good or bad success of the marksmen. And splendid specimens of men they were—firm, proud, yet courteous and gentle, well dressed in their handsome and handy costume, strong as lions, which, in fact, they "needed to be" to support the weight of those young eighteen pounders which they called rifles, with brass enough in the stocks to manufacture faces for a dynasty of railroad kings. Never did I see finer fellows. And the women! How lovely are those Tyrolese damsels, with their dark brown glossy hair braided under the green hat, with a brilliant carnation stuck over their left ear in a pretty coquettish fashion, enough to send an unfortunate bachelor raving. And their complexions! the very flower in their hair paling, looking dull beside their blooming cheeks; and their clear soft hazel eyes, with such a soul of kindness, gentleness and purity peeping through them, as one scarcely sees, even in one and another elsewhere.
The shooting was at last over, the winner crowned with flowers, and, the targets borne in triumph before them, the whole party retired to the wooden hut with a mystic triangle in a circle over the door, to eat, drink, and be merry; and very merry we were, albeit the only tipple strongly resembled very indifferent red ink, both in taste and color. Talk of the dura messorum ilia! what insides those fellows must have had!
We were sitting listening to interminable stories of Berg-geister, and Gemsen Könige, and rifle practice at French live targets, when two herd lads came in from some of the higher mountain pastures, and reported three chamois, seen that morning low down on the cliffs.
Hereupon up rose a vast clatter among the yägers as to the fortunate man who was to go after them, for chamois hunting, gentle reader, requires rather less retinue and greater quiet than pheasant shooting in October.
The lot fell upon one Joseph something or another; I never could make out his surname, if he had one—which I rather doubt. He was a fine, handsome, jaunty fellow, with "nut-brown hair" curling round his open forehead, and a moustache for which a guardsman would have given his little finger.
Now, as it fell out, I also got excited; I too thirsted after chamois' blood; but how to get it? How could I, small five foot seven, and rather light in the build, persuade that Hercules to let me accompany him, unless he put me in his pocket, which would have been derogatory? It is true that I, being light myself, was perfectly convinced that weight was rather an incumbrance than otherwise in the mountains; but how could I persuade the "heavy," whose opinions, of course, ran the other way, to agree with me?