We decided to go back to where we could climb down on that side, halter the horses, leave all extra accoutrements, and stalk those stags, and take a picture of them.

I led the way, and descended under the rim.  It was up and down over rough shale, and up steps of broken rocks, and down little cliffs.  We crossed the ridge twice, many times having to lend a hand to each other.

At length I reached a point where I could see the stags lying down.  The place was an open spot on a rocky promonotory with a fringe of low spruces.  The stags were magnificent in size, with antlers in the velvet.  One had twelve points.  They were lying in the sun to harden their horns, according to our guide.

I slipped back to the others, and we all decided to have a look.  So we climbed up.  All of us saw the stags, twitching ears and tails.

Then we crept back, and once more I took the lead to crawl round under the ledge so we could come up about even with them.  Here I found the hardest going yet.  I came to a wind-worn crack in the thin ledge, and from this I could just see the tips of the antlers.  I beckoned the others.  Laboriously they climbed.  R.C. went through first.  I went over next, and then came Teague.

R.C. and I started to crawl down to a big rock that was our objective point.  We went cautiously, with bated breath and pounding hearts.  When we got there I peeped over to see the stags still lying down.  But they had heads intent and wary.  Still I did not think they had scented us.  R.C. took a peep, and turning excitedly he whispered: 

“See only one.  And he’s standing!”

And I answered:  “Let’s get down around to the left where we can get a better chance.”  It was only a few feet down.  We got there.

When he peeped over at this point he exclaimed:  “They’re gone!”

It was a keen disappointment.  “They winded us,” I decided.

We looked and looked.  But we could not see to our left because of the bulge of rock.  We climbed back.  Then I saw one of the stags loping leisurely off to the left.  Teague was calling.  He said they had walked off the promontory, looking up, and stopping occasionally.

Then we realized we must climb back along that broken ridge and then up to the summit of the mountain.  So we started.

That climb back was proof of the effect of excitement on judgment.  We had not calculated at all on the distance or ruggedness, and we had a job before us.  We got along well under the western wall, and fairly well straight across through the long slope of timber, where we saw sheep tracks, and expected any moment to sight an old ram.  But we did not find one, and when we got out of the timber upon the bare sliding slope we had to halt a hundred times.  We could zigzag only a few steps.  The altitude was twelve thousand feet, and oxygen seemed scarce.  I nearly dropped.  All the climbing appeared to come hardest on the middle of my right foot, and it could scarcely have burned hotter if it had been in fire.  Despite the strenuous toil there were not many moments that I was not aware of the vastness of the gulf below, or the peaceful lakes, brown as amber, or the golden parks.  And nearer at hand I found magenta-colored Indian paint brush, very exquisite and rare.