armed by the great decrease of the game, and the
danger of the extermination of species. In the past India has been the
finest and best-stocked hunting-ground of all Asia, quite beyond
compare, and the destruction of her once-splendid fauna of big game
would be a zoological calamity.

_Tibet_.--As yet, Tibet offers free hunting, without legal let or
hindrance, to every sportsman who can climb up to her lofty, wind-swept
and whizzing-cold plateau. The man who hunts the _Ovis poli_, superb
creature though it be, pays in full for his trophies. The ibex of the
south help out the compensatory damages, but even with that, the list of
species available in southern Tibet is painfully small. The Mitchell
takin can be reached from China, via Chungking, after a long, hard
journey, over Consul Mason Mitchell's trail; but the takin is about the
only large hoofed game available.

_The Altai Mountains_, of western China, contain the magnificent
Siberian argali, the grandfather of all sheep species, whose horns must
be seen to be believed. Through a quest for that species the Russian
military authorities played upon Mr. George L. Harrison and his comrade
a very grim and unsportsmanlike joke. At the frontier military post, on
the Russo-Chinese border, the two Americans were courteously halted,
hospitably entertained, and _prevented_ from going into the
argali-infested mountains that loomed up before them only a few miles
away! The Russian officers said:

"Sheep? Why, if you really want sheep, we will send out some of our
brave soldiers to shoot some for you; but there is no need for _you_ to
take the trouble to go after them!"

After Mr. Harrison and his comrade had spent $5,000, and traveled half
way around the world for those sheep, that is in brief the story of how
the cup of Tantalus was given them by the Russians, actually _at their
goal_! As spoil-sports, those Russian officers were the champions of the
world.

Seven hundred miles southeastward of the Altai Mountains of western
China, guarded by the dangerous hostility of savage native tribes, there
exists and awaits the scientific explorer, according to report, an
undiscovered wild horse. The Bicolored Wild Horse is black and white,
and joy awaits the zoologist or sportsman who sees it first. Evidently
it will not soon be exterminated by modern rifles.

_The Impenetrable Forests_.--Although the mountains of central Asia will
in time be cleared of their big game,--when by h