Although the conies have enough sense of self-preservation to burrow among the rocks for shelter, they have not sufficient instinct to escape their capturers when once they have tracked them down. The men sit patiently for hours outside the conies’ entrance door, and when at last the little creatures come out in single file to search for a meal, a stick suddenly descends on one head after another; sometimes fourteen to fifteen in one family are killed off in this way. Twenty men were chosen out, from those that offered, to act as carriers, two more were appointed guides, and two of special strength were told off to help me over the exceptionally rough bits of climbing. While the necessary agreements were being gone through, the sky became suddenly overcast with dense, threatening clouds, and a loud clap of thunder, that reverberated all round us again and again, scattered us in every direction with great speed to our several homes. From the tiny window of our bedraggled tent we peeped out at the storm, as the forked lightning struck one peak after another almost simultaneously, and the thunder concussions made the very mountains tremble. [Illustration: SNOW PEAKS.] An Academy picture, of many years back, illustrating Dante’s Inferno, seemed to have assumed living form here. It was almost impossible to believe that such a transformation could have taken place in so short a time, for in comparatively few minutes day was plunged into night, calm into torrential storms, and quietude into a fierce battle of the elements.