Many a haunch of good
mutton have I obtained in this way.
The Himalayan golden eagle is a very carrion crow, never destroying
its own game, and feeding on any dead carcass it may find,
Many an eagle have I shot feeding on the carcass of an unfortunate
hill bullock, which, either through stupidity or fright, had tumbled
over a precipice; and never, during the many years I shot over all
parts of these hills, do I remember seeing a golden eagle pounce on or
carry away a living prey.
The Tartar shepherds near the snow informed me that during the lambing
season the eagles were very troublesome. If a ewe dropped a sickly
lamb, and left it, the eagle would attack it, but never attempted to
stoop to carry away a live one, or one that followed its mother. The
Indian golden eagle is identical with the Lammergeyer of the Alps, but
wants the courage of the latter bird.
A companion and myself had been working hard in the "Sogla," one of
the passes in the snowy range conducting into Chinese Tartary, after
the wild sheep, and found them this day wilder and more wary than on
any previous occasion. It is not generally known that there are two
species of wild sheep--one called the dairuk, and the other (an
enormous animal, at least as far as its horns are concerned) known to
naturalists as the _ovis ammon_. The horns and head of the latter are
as much as a hill man can lift, and singular enough the body is small
indeed, out of all proportion to the horns borne by a full-grown ram.
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