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The following day Heller went out with the hunters and saw two gorals but did not get a shot. In the meantime Yvette and I ran the traps and prepared the small mammals. While we were far up on the mountain-side, Baron Haendel-Mazzetti appeared armed with ropes and an alpine snow ax.
The Mongol yelled with fright, for the animal nearly shoved him off the rocks and dashed into the bottom of the ravine where it took refuge in another cave. I would not have taken that thousand-foot climb again for all the gorals in China, but Harry started down at once.
The larger part of Fukien, like many other provinces in China, has been denuded of forests, and the groves of pine which remain have all been planted. This deforestation consequently has driven out the game, and except for tigers, leopards, wolves, wild pigs, serows and gorals, none of the large species is left.
Heller, with two natives, keeping near the river, while I climbed up the hill to work along the cliffs half way to the summit. In less than ten minutes Heller heard a loud snort and, looking up, saw three gorals standing on a ledge seventy-five yards above him. He fired twice but missed and the animals disappeared around a corner of the hill.
The scales of the pangolin are considered to be of great value in the treatment of certain diseases and the skins are usually sold by the pound as are the horns of deer, wapiti, gorals, and serows. Almost all of the fossil animals which have been obtained in China by foreigners have been purchased in apothecary shops.
Their eyes had never been dimmed by study and I suppose were as keen as those of primitive man who possibly hunted gorals or their relatives thousands of years ago over these same hills. There were many glorious hunts and it would be wearisome were I to describe them all, but one afternoon stands out in my memory above the others.
After two days of rain during which I had a hard and unsuccessful hunt for serows we decided to return to the temple at the foot of the mountain which was nearer to the forests inhabited by these animals. We had already been in our camp on the meadow for nine days and, besides the gorals, had gathered a large and valuable collection of small mammals.
It was at the latter place that we had our best opportunity to observe gorals and learn something of their habits. We were camping on the banks of a branch of the Shwelie River, which had cut a narrow gorge for itself; on one side this was seven or eight hundred feet deep.
It was a delightfully warm day and Hotenfa told me in his vivid sign language that the gorals were likely to be asleep on the sunny side of the ravine; therefore we worked up the opposite slope.
We found, however, that a flat trajectory high-power rifle such as those with which we were armed was absolutely essential for many of our shots were at long range and we frequently killed gorals at three hundred yards or over. The camera equipment consisted of two 3A Kodaks, a Graphic 4 × 5 tripod camera, and Graflex 4 × 5 for rapid work.
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