of unusually dark-looking antelopes attracted observation in an
adjacent valley. Reconnoitring them through a pocket-telescope
from the acclivity on which we stood, I at once exclaimed that
they were new; and having announced my intention of pursuing them,
if requisite, to the world’s end, I dashed down the slope,
followed by the derision of the Hottentots, for my unsportsman-
like attention to an ‘ugly buck,’ _one_ specimen of which,
however, I assured them I would rather possess than all the
elephants in Africa! In an instant I was in the middle of the
herd, which was then crossing the valley—nine chestnut-coloured
does leading, and two magnificent coal-black bucks—all with
scimitar-shaped horns—bringing up the rear. Hastily dismounting, I
was delighted to observe them stand for a few seconds within fifty
yards, and stare at me with amazement. In vain was it, however,
that I pulled the trigger of my rifle; three several times the
heavy machinery of the lock descended with alarming vehemence, but
no report followed the concussion; and the herd having in the
meantime ascended a steep hill, I fairly rode my horse to a
standstill in the attempt to overtake them. Cursing my hard
fortune as I dashed the hateful weapon to the ground, I hastened
to the camp to repair my rifle; armed with which, and mounted on a
fresh steed, I returned with my companion to the spot, where,
having taken up the footmarks, we followed them, with unwearied
perseverance, among the hills, during the whole of that and the
following day, without attaining even a glimpse of the objects of
our quest. At noon of the third day, however, peeping cautiously
over a bank, our laudable assiduity was rewarded by the gratifying
sight of the two bucks grazing by themselves, unconscious of our
approach, in a stony valley.
“Having disposed our forces, after a moment’s consultation, so as
to intercept the game from a tangled labyrinth of ravines, the
attack was made. The hind leg of the handsomer of the two was
dangling in an instant, and in another he was sprawling on the
earth. Quickly recovering himself, however, he led me more than a
mile over the sharp stones ere he was brought to bay, when, twice
charging gallantly, he was at length overthrown and slain.
“It were vain to attempt a description of the sensations I
experienced when thus, after three days of toilsome tacking and
feverish anxiety, unalleviated by any incident that could inspire
the smallest hope of ultimate success, I at length found myself in
actual possession of so brilliant an addition to the riches of
natural history. The prize evidently belonged to the Aigocerine
group, and was equal in stature to a large galloway. The horns,
which were flat, and upwards of three feet in length, swept
gracefully over the back in the form of a crescent. A bushy black
mane extended from the lively chestnut-coloured ears to the middle
of the back; the tail was long and tufted; and the glossy jet-
black hue of the greater portion of the body contrasted
beautifully with a snow-white face and belly. We thought we could
never have looked at or admired it sufficiently; my companion
observing, after a long pause, ‘that the Sable Antelope would
doubtless become the admiration of the world,’ A drawing and
description having been completed on the spot, the skin was
carefully removed and conveyed upon a pack-horse in triumph to the
camp; and it may possibly interest those of my readers, who shall
have followed me during the last three days, to learn that I
succeeded, with infinite difficulty, in bringing this unique and
interesting specimen of African zoology, in a state of high
preservation, to Cape Town, where, in October last, it was
elegantly set up by Monsieur Verreaux, the French naturalist, and
obligingly taken to England by my well-known friend Captain
Alexander, 42nd Royal Highlanders, and is now in the British
Museum.”
On January 9th, 1838, Harris exhibited his mounted specimen of the
Sable Antelope at a meeting of the Zoological Society of London, and
proposed for it the apposite scientific name “_niger_.” The same
specimen was subsequently figured in the second volume of the Society’s
‘Transactions.’
Writing in 1881 Mr. Selous gave the following account of the
distribution of the Sable Antelope at that period:—
“At the present a few Sable Antelopes are still to be found in
south-western. Matabele Land, in the neighbourhood of the
Ramokwebani, Shashani, and Samookwe rivers (tributaries of the
Shashe). Along the waggon-road leading from Tati to the Zambesi it
may be met with here and there, but is decidedly scarce. All along
the Chobe river, as far as I have been, I have met with this
Antelope, though sparingly. In the Mābābe country, and on the road
leading from there to Bamangwato, I neither saw a Sable Antelope
nor the spoor of one, and do not think its range extends so far to
the west. In the broken country to the south of the Victoria
Falls, in the neighbourhood of the Pendamatenka and Daka rivers,
it is not uncommon, but its true home is the higher portions of
the Mashuna country, to the north-east of the Matabele country.
There it is the commonest Antelope, and may still be met with in
herds of over fifty individuals, the usual number being from ten
to twenty. However large the herd, I have never seen more than one
full-grown bull with it, though there may be several half-grown
ones; whilst in a large herd of any other kind of Antelopes two or
more full-grown males are nearly always to be seen. On the Manica
plateau, north of the Zambesi, Sable Antelopes are also to be met
with. The longest pair of male Sable Antelope’s horns I have seen
measured 45 inches over the curve, the longest pair of female 33
inches. In the Mashuna country and along the Chobe the average
length of the horns of these animals is greater than in south-
western Matabele Land.”
In his admirable work entitled ‘A Breath from the Veldt’ Mr. John
Millais has devoted many pages and sketches to the illustration of this
splendid creature, which he evidently places as the finest of all the
Antelopes of South Africa. He describes it as follows:—
“In general appearance and sporting qualities the Sable Antelope
(_Hippotragus niger_) yields the palm to none of its kind. There
is about the whole animal that indescribable charm that is so
intensely African and associated with the wild life. Its strong
individuality must ever stand out in the minds of those who have
been so fortunate as to see and shoot it, and it is certainly one
of the chief objects of interest in the splendid fauna of that
country. Apart from its satin-like hide, sweeping horns, erect
mane, and great strength, the Sable Antelope presents an
appearance of fearlessness and nobility that is very striking, to
say the least of it. Though the Koodoo surpasses his rival in
elegance and general appearance when dead, he is but a skulker,
and makes but a poor show beside the Sable on the Veldt. I would
say, if such a comparison be allowable, the two hold their own
like the rival beauties of a London drawing-room. The fair beauty
sits quietly in a corner, charming her immediate circle with her
graceful shyness and beauty, and people take sly glances at her
from the other end of the room, while pretending to devote their
attention to someone else. What a contrast with her black-eyed
rival, who flaunts into the room as if she owned the entire show,
and commands the attention of all eyes by her flashy and striking
beauty! The one attracts attention slowly, the other commands it
at once. Roughly speaking, the height of this grand Antelope at
the shoulder is about 4½ feet, but he looks much taller, owing to
his great shoulders and unusually thick neck, ornamented with its
erect crest of hair. The tail is long, and has a good wisp of hair
at the end, which, like the tails of the Roan Antelope and the
Waterbuck, swings from side to side as the animal gallops away.
Like the Koodoo, the horns of the Sable are its chief glory, and
the noble manner in which the head is carried by the buck when on
the move is a splendid thing to see. Unlike all Deer, and nearly
all Antelope, the Sable when running arches the neck instead or
raising the chin; this gives the animal its nice picture-booky
look, and I could hardly imagine a finer subject for an animal
painter than a herd of these grand beasts on the move, if their
heads and necks be properly drawn.”
Mr. F. V. Kirby, F.Z.S., in his ‘Haunts of Wild Game,’ also devotes
a whole chapter to an account of his rencontres with this Antelope,
which he found “by no means rare” in his favourite hunting-grounds in
the Lydenburg district of the Transvaal, and gives several excellent
illustrations of its noble form.
Lastly, Mr. J. Ffolliott Darling, F.Z.S., has kindly favoured us with
the following field-notes on this Antelope as lately observed by him in
Mashonaland and Matabeleland:—
“These Antelopes, of which the Mashona names are _Inguarāti_ and
_Marabālla_, were much more numerous before the incursion of the
Pioneers in 1890, but even now, in most out-of-the-way places,
they are abundant, especially on the higher parts of the plateau,
which is from 3000 to 5000 feet high. As late as 1896 I have seen
troops of these bucks lying out on the open flats at midday, far
from any cover, but, as a rule, when much disturbed and hunted,
they seek concealment in the bush for their daily sleep. They
usually go in troops of from 5 to 12 or 15, the largest herd I
ever counted consisting of 22 individuals; I often heard of troops
of 50 or 60, but when an opportunity offered of counting them they
invariably resolved themselves into a score or so. Occasionally
one comes across a bull keeping altogether by himself, and in such
cases I always found him very wary and almost impossible to
approach within shot. Whatever may be the reason for his going
alone, it is evidently the same cause that has also made him very
suspicious and cautious. I have known a lone bull haunt a certain
spot for months, and have seen him frequently, but never in
company. Sometimes 3 or 4 bulls will be found together, but
usually herds are mixed—young and old, male and female, run
together; a troop of 10 will consist of one big bull, 3 or 4
younger males, and the remainder cows or young ones. The old bulls
don’t seem to wish to drive away the younger males, as Deer do.
“One day, as I was quietly meandering through the bush in
Mashonaland, a troop of 10 or 12 Sable came trotting by. About
half had gone past me without suspicion, when a cow took the
alarm, and, stopping suddenly, looked in my direction. She could
not exactly make out the enemy, but after a few seconds she
stamped her foot two or three times and snorted, as if to warn the
others to keep quiet. They all stopped, gazing about, but finally
cantered off without having satisfied their curiosity.
“These Antelopes fight very well with their long curved horns, and
strike sideways very quickly. A dog that is unwise enough to run
up behind and try to lay hold of one has little chance of escaping
impalement. A bull won’t run very far from a dog, but will stop to
fight him, and if the dog keeps out of his reach and stays running
round and barking at him the hunter can easily get up for a shot.
“When taken young, Sables get very tame and bold, and will push
open the door and demolish a loaf of bread or any other eatables
that may be handy. A young bull used to frequent the laager at
Salisbury during the Mashonaland rebellion in 1896; he was very
friendly with white folks, but—unlike some of the stay-at-home
philanthropists—knew the difference between white and black men
very well, and if a ‘black brother’ took any liberties with him he
was promptly knocked down.
“The Sable calves are mostly born in November and December (spring
and early summer), but I have shot cows heavy with young at the
same time that others had good-sized calves.”
Passing northwards of the Zambesi we find the Sable Antelope recorded
by Peters, in his ‘Reise nach Mossambique,’ as met with in the
Portuguese dominions west of Tette, and on the woody plains of Sena.
In Nyasaland Mr. Crawshay tells us it is not by any means evenly
distributed, but appears to be plentiful in some places. In the Shiré
Highlands, as Sir Harry Johnston writes, the Sable is one of the
commonest Antelopes, frequenting the wooded hills rather than the
low-lying plains, and we have seen many heads obtained by Mr. Sharpe,
the late Capt. Sclater, and others from this district.
Sir Harry Johnston believes that the Sable Antelope is also found on
the Nyasa-Tanganyika plateau; but it has not, so far as we are aware,
been obtained there by Mr. Sharpe, Mr. Crawshay, Mr. Yule, and others
who have traversed that district. It, however, certainly occurs again
further north in the coast-district of German East Africa. Herr Oscar
Neumann informs us that during his journey through German and British
East Africa he never saw a specimen of _H. niger_ alive, but only
the skin of one that had been killed near Tanga on the coast. His
opinion is that the species is not now to be met with anywhere in the
interior of German East Africa, but that there are still some herds of
it left on the coast opposite Zanzibar, near Tanga and Pangani. In this
district it was formerly hunted by Sir John Kirk, in whose collection
there is a head of the Sable Antelope, which has been examined by
Sclater. The specimen, as Sir John kindly informs us, was obtained
about twelve miles inland, somewhat to the north of the River Wami, in
the winter of 1884–5.
Whether the Sable Antelope occurs much further north than this seems
to be by no means certain. Sir Harry Johnston has enumerated it among
the Antelopes of the Kilimanjaro district (Kilimanjaro Exp. p. 354).
Sir John Willoughby had a shot at what “_he believed_ was a herd
of ‘Sable Antelopes’” on his journey from Mombasa into the interior
in 1886 (East Africa, pp. 46, 47), but did not secure a specimen. Mr.
Jackson and Mr. Gedge “_saw_ a herd of about ten or twelve near
Gulu Gulu in November 1888,” but Mr. Jackson admits that no European
has yet bagged a Sable Antelope in British East Africa.
There is also no good authority for the occurrence of the Sable
Antelope still further north on the White Nile, although it is included
in Heuglin’s List of N.E. African Mammals as being met with in the
Shilluk country on the authority of v. Pruyssenaer. We may therefore,
for the present, draw the northern limit of the Sable Antelope on the
east side of Africa at somewhere about the 5th degree N. lat. On the
western side of Africa the Sable Antelope, which Mr. Selous has already
shown to occur on the Manica Plateau in Barotseland, appears to extend
thence into Southern Angola, where, according to Prof. Barboza du
Bocage, Welwitsch obtained it in Mossamedes[9].
[Illustration:
Fig. 91.
Head of Sable Antelope.
]
Many living specimens of the Sable Antelope have been brought to Europe
of late years. The first example, a male, reached our Zoological
Society’s Gardens in 1861, and a second male in 1873. In 1895 a fine
young pair were purchased of Mr. C. Reiche, of Alfeld, along with the
young female Giraffe which arrived in February of that year. They have
done well and are still thriving, but have not yet bred.
At the Zoological Gardens of Hamburg they have been more fortunate
with this species, a fine calf having been born there on the 1st
of May, 1894. Of this interesting animal we are able to give an
illustration (Plate LXXX.) through the kindness of the Director, Dr.
Bolau, who has sent Sclater an excellent water-colour drawing of the
mother and young, executed by the well-known German zoological artist
Leutemann, when the young one was rather more than a fortnight old.
Other Continental gardens have also now, or have lately had, living
representatives of this beautiful species. In the Cologne Gardens, as
Dr. Wunderlich kindly informs us, this Antelope has bred twice—in
April 1896, when the period of gestation was observed to be 272 days,
and in March 1898, when it was reckoned at 281 days.
Our illustration of the male of this Antelope (Plate LXXIX.) was put
on the stone by Mr. Smit, under the direction of the late Sir Victor
Brooke, about twenty years ago, from a water-colour sketch prepared by
Mr. Wolf, but we have not been able to ascertain from what specimen it
was taken. Mr. Smit at the same time prepared a wood-block of the head
(fig. 91, p. 38), which he believes was taken from a specimen lent to
Sir Victor by Mr. Selous.
Besides Harris’s original type specimen to which we have already called
attention, there are mounted examples of both sexes of this Antelope
and a mounted skeleton in the British Museum received from Mr. Selous,
who procured them in Mashonaland. There are also in the National
Collection a skin of an adult female from Caffreland (_Wahlberg_),
three skins from Nyasaland presented by Sir Harry Johnston, and a skin
from Lake Mweru presented by Mr. Alfred Sharpe, besides several skulls
and pairs of horns from different localities.
_January,_ 1899.
Genus II. ORYX.
Type.
_Oryx_, De Blainville, Bull. Soc. Philom. 1816, p. 75 O. gazella.
Size medium or large. Tail with a long and thick terminal tuft. Hairs
along the neck and spine with their points projecting towards the head,
the parting being situated on the rump or behind the middle of the back.
Skull with small lachrymal vacuities and of the same general structure
as in _Hippotragus_; but the bases of the horns, instead of rising
vertically above the eyes and forming an elevated forehead as in that
genus, project straight backwards, continuing the line of the face and
lying in the same plane as the nasal bones.
Horns long, cylindrical, slender, straight, or with a gradual and
gentle backward curvature, diverging at a very acute angle; ribbed in
their basal half.
_Female_ with horns as in the male.
_Range of the Genus._ Africa south of the Sahara, except in
the west-coast woodland and Congo Basin; also Southern Arabia.
The five species of the genus here recognized may be arranged as
follows:—
_a._ Horns, when fully developed, crescentically recurved throughout.
Neck and part of the shoulder to the base of the fore leg of a ruddy-
brown hue and strongly contrasted with the yellowish-white tint of the
body. 113. _O. leucoryx._
_b._ Horns normally straight or nearly so. Neck of the same colour as
the body.
_a1._ Size smaller (height about 3 ft. at the withers). Legs, with the
exception of the pasterns, which are white, of a nearly uniform brown
colour both outside and inside; body of a nearly uniform dirty white;
no black spinal stripe, and only a faint throat-stripe; tips and edges
of ears white; nearly the whole of the cheek beneath the eye covered
with a large brown or blackish patch continuous with the ocular
stripe; at most a faint brown stripe passing along the side above the
belly; tail-tuft white at the base. 114. _O. beatrix._
_b1._ Size larger (height about 4 ft. at the withers). Colour of legs
below knees and hocks pale dirty white, and lighter in tint than the
body, though often patched with black in front; body and neck of a
nearly uniform tawny hue, with a dark spinal stripe and a deep black
throat-stripe; tips and adjacent edges of ears black; cheek below the
eye of the same colour as the neck, bounded in front by the black
ocular stripe and behind by a similar stripe running from near the
base of the ear; a deep black stripe running along the side above the
whitish belly; tail-tuft black.
_a2._ Hairs on throat long, frequently forming a median tuft or beard;
nasal patch black, united on both sides with the lower end of the
ocular stripe and passing beneath the jaw, so as to form a complete
black ring round the white muzzle; a black stripe above the knee on
the fore leg, extending on the outer side almost to the shoulder; a
large black patch on the rump; a black stripe above the belly on both
sides continued on to the thigh, and there united with a large patch
of the same colour, which covers the hind leg, both outside and
inside, almost down to the hocks; a black patch or stripe on the front
of the cannon-bone of the hind leg. 115. _O. gazella._
_b2._ Hairs on throat short, not forming a tuft or beard; nasal patch
not meeting the ocular stripe, so that the muzzle is not circumscribed
by a continuous black band; black stripe above the knee on the fore
leg only extending about halfway up to the shoulder; hind-quarters of
a nearly uniform tawny tint, without any black patches on the rump or
thighs; lateral stripe above the belly not passing on to the thigh;
hind legs without any black bands or stripes.
_a3._ Black hairs on the ears not produced into a tuft; parting of the
hairs on the dorsal median line lying far back upon the rump.
116. _O. beisa._
_b3._ Hairs on the ears produced into a long black tuft; parting of
the hairs along the spine situated a little behind the middle of the
back. 117. _O. callotis._
[Illustration:
THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, Pl. LXXXI
_Wolf del. Smit lith._
_Hanhart imp_
The Leucoryx.
ORYX LEUCORYX
_Published by R. H. Porter._
]
113. THE LEUCORYX.
ORYX LEUCORYX (Licht.).
[PLATE LXXXI]
_Algazel_, =Buff=. Hist. Nat. xii. pp. 211 & 272, pl. xxxiii. figs. 1 &
2 (horns) (1764).
_L’Algazelle_, =F. Cuv.= H. N. Mamm. i. pl. 376 (1819) (Senegal).
_Antilope gazella_, =Pall.= Spic. Zool. fasc. xii. p. 17 (1777) (nec
_Capra gazella_, Linn.); =Kerr=, Linn. An. K. p. 316 (1792); =Daudin=,
in Lacépède’s Buffon, xiv. p. 182 (1799); =Bechst.= Syst. Uebers.
vierf. Th. ii. p. 642 (1800); =Desm.= N. Dict. d’H. N. (1) xxiv. Tabl.
p. 32 (1804); =Goldf.= Schr. Säug. v. p. 1182 (1819); =Schinz=, Cuv.
Thierr. i. p. 394 (1821); =Desmoul.= Dict. Class. d’H. N. i. p. 444
(1822); =Desm.= Mamm. ii. p. 475 (1822); =Savi=, Isis, 1832, p. 499;
=Rüpp.= N. Wirbelth. p. 16 (1835); =Oken=, Allg. Naturg. vii. p. 1396
(1838); =F. Cuv.= Index to H. N. Mamm. p. 5 (1842); =Wagn.= Schr.
Säug. Suppl. iv. p. 481 (1844); =Schinz=, Syn. Mamm. ii. p. 437
(1845); =Gieb.= Säug. p. 295 (1853).
_Cerophorus_ (_Oryx_) _gazella_, =Blainv.= Bull. Soc. Philom. 1816, p.
75.
_Oryx gazella_, =Jent.= Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, ix.) p. 135
(1887); =id.= Cat. Mamm. Leyd. Mus. (op. cit. xi.) p. 166 (1892);
=Matsch.= SB. Ges. nat. Fr. 1893, p. 104; =Pousargues=, Ann. Sci. Nat.
(7) iv. p. 131 (1896); =Trouessart=, Cat. Mamm. fasc. iv. p. 954
(1898).
_Cemas algazel_, =Oken=, Lehrb. Nat. iii. pt. 2, p. 741 (1816) (part.).
_Antilope algazella_, =Rüpp.= N. Wirb. Abyss. p. 26 (1835).
_Antilope tao_, =H. Sm.= Griff. An. K. iv. p. 189, v. p. 327 (1827); =A.
Sm.= S. Afr. Quart. Journ. ii. p. 187 (1834); =Schinz=, Syn. Mamm. ii.
p. 425 (1845).
_Antilope leucoryx_, Licht. Darst. Säug. pl. i. (1827) (nec Pall.);
=Hempr. & Ehr.= Symb. Phys. Decas ii. pl. iii. (1828) (Dongola);
=Fisch.= Syn. Mamm. p. 478 (1829); =Waterh.= Cat. Mamm. Mus. Z. S. (2)
p. 41 (1838); =Oken=, Allg. Naturg. vii. p. 1394 (1838); =Laurill.=
Dict. Univ. d’H. N. i. p. 618 (1841); =Reichenb.= Säug. iii. p. 120,
pl. xxxvii. (1845); =Schinz=, Syn. Mamm. ii. p. 434 (1845); =id.= Mon.
Antil. p. 32, pl. xxxvi. (1848).