w
more serious day by day.

"Thinks the tribes mean to starve us out," said Roberts one evening when
the Colonel went away from the table looking more depressed and anxious
than usual.

"And they won't," said Drummond. "Why, there are mountain sheep enough
up yonder to keep us for years."

"They get more difficult to shoot, though," said Bracy.

"Pooh! not they. A few close by are a bit shy; but, look here, when we
get right up on the shoulder of that left-hand peak and look north what
do we see?"

"Mountains," replied Bracy.

"And when we were right up on that farthest peak last week, and looked
north, what did we see then?"

"More mountains."

"That's it; and you might go on and on for a month, and it would be the
same--more mountains."

Bracy nodded and looked thoughtful.

"Yes," he said at last; "the world's a long way from being played out
yet. We can see hundreds of peaks, and the soft blue valleys between
them, which I suppose have never been traversed by man."

"That's right enough, and that's where the wild sheep and goats are just
as they always have been, perfectly undisturbed. Thousands--perhaps
millions, without counting the goats and yaks, which look as if they
were a vain brood of beast who try to grow tails like a horse."

"I suppose you're correct, Drummond," said Bracy.

"Of course I am; and if we shoot down all the sheep near at hand one
month, more will come down from the north next month."

"Just the same as when you catch a big trout out of a hole at home,
another is sure to come within a day or two to take his empty house."

"Why, they do up here, and the little seer in the river too," cried
Drummond. "I say, I wish this was a bigger and deeper stream, so that
it held the big forty and fifty pound fish."

"Quite deep and swift enough for us," said Bracy merrily.

"Ah, yes," said Drummond slowly; "I haven't forgotten our going for that
nice long walk."

"No," said Roberts; "that was a close shave for all of us. How many
more times are we going to run the gauntlet and not get hit?"

"Hundreds, I hope," replied Drummond; and Bracy, who was very quiet,
thought, by no means for the first time, of his escapes, and of how it
would be at home if a letter reached them some day reporting that one of
the lieutenants had been checked once for all in his career.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

PERIL IN A POSHTIN.

Another fortnight passed, during which the officers had a day's sho