when he gambolled about, barked with joy, and then departed.

Some months afterwards a man was tried at the Wexford Assizes for burglary and robbery, was convicted, and sentenced to transportation for fifteen years. Before his removal from the county-prison, he informed the governor that he had been working in the locality of the farmhouse alluded to; and, hearing that there was a large sum of money in the house, had formed a resolution to break into and rob the premises. Although he was a stranger to the place-having come from the county of Kilkenny, some forty miles off-he was well aware of the character of Snap. He said that he went to the house with the intention of robbing it, and of murdering the farmer's wife, if it should be necessary; but that on looking through the kitchen-window, he saw the dog turn an angry look at him, and that on four or five subsequent visits to the window, the dog did the same; he was thus driven from his murderous purpose, for, he said, ne well knew the dog would discover him.-The Animal World.

CHAPTER XXV.

GOATS OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.

So much has been written from time to time about hunters and hunting in the Far West, that one is really almost tempted to believe that nothing more remains to be told which may be thought worth the telling. Nevertheless, as hunters' stories generally are devoted more to the records of slaughter and hairbreadth escapes than to descriptions of the habits and everyday doings of animals tenanting the country hunted, I am vain enough to believe that I can, even in the face of all that has been previously written, still find matters of interest concerning the animals, the habits of which I

had from time to time opportunities of watching, whilst rambling as a hunter and trapper amidst the wild solitudes of the Rocky Mountains.

One midsummer I was in the higher levels of the Rocky Mountains, about 10,000 feet above the sea. My camp was in a well-sheltered hollow, shut in on the one side by a massive pile of bare grey granite dotted with patches of snow, that had bid defiance to the sun's power, and held their own, despite his "melting persuasions," upon the ledges and in the hollows betwixt the splintered crags. On the other side, a ridge covered with a tough vegetation, and dotted with scrubby pinetrees dwarfed and contorted by the chill blasts of winter, formed a pleasant barrier. Behind, a wall of slatelike rock formed an effectual defence against storms or sudden intrusion from rearward by either Indian or fourfooted foes; while in front, a kind of open glade led away to a lake which was fed by the drip from a glacier.

The sun has by midsummer, to a great extent, cleared away the winter's mantle of snow; and patches of bright green herbage, like well-kept lawns, stretch from the basis of the glaciers down the slopes of the rocky cliffs, or wherever the regular drip of the melting ice and snow keeps up a kind of continuous irrigation. Hardy flowers of Alpine type begin to overspread the mosscovered knolls, and push their bright corollas out of the clefts of the rocks. The only tree, if tree it can be called, that flourishes at all at this altitude is the Twisted Pine, and even that has a starved and stunted appearance. Everywhere the eye rests on huge piles of snow, that never entirely melt but keep all beneath them damp by the slow steady slush of the thaw; and one might easily imagine the little oases of green, here and there discernible amid the snow, to be islands in a frozen sea.

Travel wheresoever one may amidst these mountains -before, behind, to the right hand or to the left—

immense pinnacles of rock seem to tower up into the very clouds. After climbing up as high as the snow and ice will permit, if the surrounding scene be scanned with a telescope, nothing is to be observed from skyline to skyline but one vast expanse of mountains of varying height and shape. Well may one pause and wonder at the power that was adequate to pile up this great central axis of elevation. The stupendous immensity of everything round about always seems to overwhelm and, if I may so say, absorb me. I feel like a mere atom amongst these, the grandest rocks in the world; and the more I ponder on this marvellous evidence of God's might and power, the more humbled and insignificant I become in my own estimation.

In one of my hunting expeditions I was sitting down -the day being bright and sunny-contemplating, half-dreamily, the same kind of scene which I have endeavoured to describe. I felt extremely tired, from having had a tough and tedious climb in order to reach a ledge of rocks from which I could, if I felt disposed, without even rising from a sitting posture, dip up the water that flowed on the one side into the Atlantic, and on the other into the Pacific Oceans. Suddenly I was startled from my reverie by hearing some stones rattle down from the rocks above the crag whereon I sat. Looking in the direction from whence the sound came, I caught sight of a splendid Rocky Mountain Goat. He was peering curiously at me, taking stock, I daresay, of the strange apparition so new to his haunts.

Never before had I contemplated so picturesque a sight as that wonderful animal perched upon a mere edge of rock. A shaggy snow-white coat hung down nearly to his hoofs. His mild but lustrous eye had a melancholy expression, which, taken in conjunction with his venerable beard and well-haired face, gave him a kind of human expression of countenance; and one need not have stretched the fancy very much to have imagined

that the Ice-King had suddenly emerged from his secret haunts, to know why a mortal had dared to invade his domains. My daily hopes since I had been on the mountains were thus suddenly and unexpectedly realised. I for the first time gazed upon a Rocky Mountain Goat amidst his native rocks. In nothing did this animal, to my mind, resemble a typical goat; but, instead, everything about it bore a much greater similitude to the antelope tribe. The horns, the shape of the body, the peculiarity of coat, the firmly-set limbs, were in nothing suggestive of a true goat.

Having taken a good look at him, I turned very gently round, to place myself in a better position, that I might bring my field-glass to bear upon him. This was enough to warn the crafty beast that probably danger lurked in the stranger, and that he must not be trusted. With one bound the goat cleared a wide chasm intervening between the crag on which he stood and the adjoining pinnacle of rock, and, quick as a flash of lightning, vanished from my sight as mysteriously as he had appeared.

I had, at any rate, discovered that goats were near my camping-ground, so I spared neither time nor labour from that time forth to watch their habits, and to obtain specimens. Very often I have tracked a small herd up some steep incline or rock, and then lost all further trace. Wandering on, half in hope and half in despair, suddenly I have espied a tiny party of goats-a patriarch, it may be, and his three or four wives, with their children-slowly making their way round some acute angle in the rocks. As one by one they came in sight, following the male, who always leads, so they marched along in single file, deliberately, and to all appearance with the utmost carelessness, although they were upon a narrow ledge of rock, where one would suppose a cat might be puzzled to find secure foothold, with a vertical wall of smooth rock above, and below, a precipice, perhaps hundreds of feet in depth.

Fire at or otherwise frighten them, and they gallop along this narrow footway as safely as they walk; and when a chasm has to be crossed, it is perfectly wonderful to note the precision and certainty with which they, one after another, light upon the same spot, rather perching after the manner of birds than landing, like hard-hoofed quadrupeds, upon the smallest available projections. I have often bowled over some of these most interesting animals, and here will be the best place to describe them. I am quite convinced that the sostyled goat of the Rocky Mountains is, in every one of its essential features and affinities, an antelope. In the highly-polished, slender, conical, and slightly-curved horns, almost jet-black, the type of the chamois is most conspicuous; in other particulars it approximates to the prong-buck.

The specific characteristics may be summed up as follows: Horns small and symmetrical, conical, black, and slightly curved in a backward direction-the points sharp, and yellowish in colour, the base regularly ringed; nose ovine, and somewhat hairy; tear-bag and mouffle none; nostrils black; hoofs black; colour of body entirely white. The coat, which is remarkably thick, is composed of two classes of hair--the one extremely long and rather coarse, beneath which is a dense covering or fleece of wool, of the very finest class, quite as delicate in fibre and texture as that of the famed goat of Cashmere, from whose fleece costly shawls are manufactured. There are rudimentary false hoofs, and a long pendant tuft of hair at the point of the chin. The size of the full-grown animal is rather larger than the average size of a domestic sheep. The outer covering of hair is extremely long, and hangs down all over the body, tail, and upper part of the legs, reminding one very much of the merino sheep; the hair is most abundant on the shoulder, neck, back, and thighs. The beard, which hangs from the chin, seems to be continued down the