The young of the mountain sheep are born in May or June above the timber-line if possible, among the most dangerous and inaccessible crags and precipices that the mother can find. The lamb’s most dangerous enemy is the eagle, and often the mother cannot protect her young from this foe. Probably the most familiar of the mountain sheep is the big-horn or Rocky Mountain sheep (_Ovis canadensis_). Formerly this was quite abundant, but so persistently has it been hunted that the species exists now only in small numbers and in widely separated localities. The general color of the big-horn is gray brown. They are well fed all the year round. The female has not the long curving horns of the male. Her horns are small, short, erect, and much flattened, in length from five to eight inches. Other species of mountain sheep are the California or Nelson’s mountain sheep (_Ovis nelsoni_) a smaller animal than the big-horn and of a pale salmon gray color; the Mexican mountain sheep (_Ovis mexicanus_) found in the state of Chihuahua, Mexico; the white mountain sheep or Dall’s sheep (_Ovis dalli_) of Alaska, whose hair is pure white, when it has not been stained by mud or dirt; the black mountain sheep (_Ovis stonei_) of northern British Colombia, which is distinguishable by the wide spread of its horns, the dark brown color of its sides and the white abdomen; and Fannin’s mountain sheep (_Ovis fannini_) a newly discovered species which was found first on the Klondike River, Alaska, in 1900. BASED ON MATERIAL DRAWN FROM “THE AMERICAN NATURAL HISTORY,” COPYRIGHT 1904, BY WILLIAM T. HORNADAY ILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR. VOL. 4. No. 13. SERIAL No. 113 [Illustration: ROCKY MOUNTAIN GOAT] Game Animals of America ROCKY MOUNTAIN GOAT Monograph Number Two in The Mentor Reading Course The Rocky Mountain goat, or the white goat (_Oreamnos montanus_), is the only American representation of the many species of wild goat-like animals so numerous throughout the Old World. Its habitat extends from northwestern Montana to the head of Cook Inlet, but it is not found in the interior nor in the Yukon Valley. It is one of the most picturesque and interesting wild animals on the continent of North America. It ranges on the grassy belt of the high mountains just above the timber-line. It seems to like particularly the dangerous ice-covered slopes over which only the boldest hunters dare to follow it. On the coast of British Columbia, however, the white goat sometimes descends very near to tide water.