List Mamm. B. M. p. 156 (1843); =id.= Ann. Mag. N. H. (1) xviii. p.
232 (1846); =Sund.= Pecora, K. Vet.-Ak. Handl. 1844, p. 206 (form α et
γ) (1846); =id.= Hornschuch’s Transl., Arch. Skand. Beitr. ii. p. 157;
Reprint, p. 81 (1848); =Gray=, P. Z. S. 1850, p. 134; =id.= Knowsl.
Men. p. 17 (1850); =id.= Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 107 (1852); =Barth=,
Reise, i. p. 589 (1850) (Asben, Centr. Afr.); =Scl.= P. Z. S. 1863, p.
230 (gestation, 8 mths.); =Fitz.= SB. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p. 177 (1869);
=Gray=, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 36 (1872); =id.= Hand-1. Rum. B. M. p. 104
(1873); =Sclater=, P. Z. S. 1873, p. 604; =Brehm=, Thierl. iii. p. 231
(1880); =Sclater=, in Wolf’s Zool. Sketches, i. pl. xxiii. (1861), ii.
pl. xix. (1868); =id.= List Anim. Z. S. (8) p. 138 (1883), (9) p. 158
(1896); =Flow. & Gars.= Cat. Coll. Surg. ii. p. 261 (1884); =Jent.=
Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, ix.) p. 135 (1887); =W. Sclater=,
Cat. Mamm. Calc. Mus. ii. p. 156 (1891); =Flow. & Lyd.= Mamm. p. 344
(1891); =Ward=, Horn Meas. (1) p. 148 (1892), (2) p. 188 (1896);
=Mockler-Ferryman=, Up the Niger, p. 50 (1892) (Lokoja, Niger);
=Jent.= Cat. Mamm. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, xi.) p. 166 (1892);
=Lyd.= Horns and Hoofs, p. 249 (1893); =Matsch.= SB. nat. Freund.
1893, p. 104; =Pousargues=, Ann. Sci. Nat. (7) iv. p. 131 (1896);
=Johnston=, P. Z. S. 1898, p. 352; =Trouessart=, Cat. Mamm. fasc. iv.
p. 955 (1898).
_Antilope ensicornis_, =Hempr. et Ehr.= Symb. Phys. i. p. i (sub _Ant.
leucoryge_) (1832); =Wagner=, Schr. Säug. Suppl. iv. p. 479 (1844), v.
p. 437 (1855) (var. β _nubica_ and var. γ _senegalensis_).
_Oryx ensicornis_, =Heugl.= Ant. u. Buff. N.O.-Afr. (N. Act. Leop. xxx.
pt. 2) p. 17 (1863); =id.= N.O.-Afr. ii. p. 113 (1877).
_Antilope (Oryx) bezoastica_, =H. Smith=, Griff. An. K. iv. p. 191, v.
p. 327 (1827). _Oryx bezoarticus_, =Fitz.= SB. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p.
178 (1869).
Vernacular Names:—_Toa_ or _Tao_ of the Hebrews and Egyptians (_Hamilton
Smith_); _Abu-harb_, of Sennaar and Kordofan Arabs (_Licht._); _Wahsch
el Baqer_ and _Baqer el Wádi_ of the Arabs (_Heuglin_); _Lymbe_ and
_Aschamel_ of the Tuaregs (_Barth._).
Height at withers about 40 inches. Prevailing colour of the sides of
the body yellowish or reddish white, often more or less dappled with
blotches of pale brown; neck and shoulders above the base of the leg
ruddy brown, this colour extending from the withers along the back and
becoming diffused over the rump, thighs, and base of the tail. Head
whitish, with a greyish-brown patch on the nose and on the forehead,
the two united by an ill-defined brownish stripe; a stripe of the
same hue extending a short distance above the eye and below it on to
the middle of the cheek; the hinder part of the cheek of the same
reddish-brown colour as the neck; ears dirty white, the tips and rims
not darkened. No distinct dark stripe along the throat, no dark stripe
along the middle of the back and nape of the neck, and only a faint
longitudinal stripe on each side between the flanks and belly; mane of
neck brown. Legs whitish in tint, clouded in front with brown, which
spreads downwards from the shoulders and thighs. Hairs along the spine
reversed from rump.
Horns long, with a bold crescentic backward curvature; attaining a
length of nearly 40 inches.
A skull offers the following measurements:—Basal length 13 inches,
muzzle to orbit 9, greatest width 5·75.
_Female_ similar to the male, but horns thinner.
_Hab._ Interior of North Africa from Dongola to Senegal.
Whatever the _Oryx_ of Aristotle, Pliny, and other ancient writers
may have been (which has been a subject of much discussion), there can
be little doubt that the _Oryx_ of Oppian, commemorated in his
celebrated poem on the Chase, was based on an Antelope of this group.
In the Latin translation of Oppian’s work it is described as a beast
much dreaded by its fellow creatures:—
“In densis etiam sævissima bestia sylvis
Trux stabulatur Oryx, odium commune ferarum
Præcipuusque timor. Cornu gerit acre, colorem
Lactis habet verni: facies est candida, solæ
In vultu malæ picea caligine nigrant:
Turgescit duplex crassa pinguedine dorsum.
Cornua sublimes excelsa feruntur in auras,
In quibus est mucro fuscus, lethalis et acer.”
The classical term “_Oryx_” was first introduced into scientific
literature by Pallas in his memoir on the genus _Antilope_
published in 1767. But here he grossly misapplied the term
“_Oryx_” to the Eland, which he called _Antilope oryx_. In
his second memoir on the same subject, however (1777), Pallas corrected
this unfortunate error, and transferred _Oryx_ to the Gemsbok of
the Cape, to which it was certainly much better applicable.
In 1816 De Blainville, when subdividing the Antelopes, first adopted
_Oryx_ as a generic term, and made the _Antilope oryx_ of
Pallas (that is, _Oryx gazella_) its type. The generic name of
the present species was thus settled, but before we can arrive at its
proper specific name some further explanation is necessary.
By modern authorities, almost without exception, the present Antelope
has been called the “Leucoryx, _Oryx leucoryx_,” and it is well
known by this name in the Museums and Zoological Gardens of Europe.
But when we proceed to investigate the strict claims of the present
animal to this title, a difficult question presents itself. The
_Antilope leucoryx_ of Pallas in all probability, and certainly
the _Antilope leucoryx_ of succeeding authors until about 1827,
was not the present species, but, as will be clearly shown in our next
article, the Beatrix.
Buffon, in his ‘Histoire Naturelle,’ called the present species
“_l’Algazel_,” and Pallas and his followers named it _Antelope
gazella_. But the term “_gazella_,” as we shall presently show,
had been previously appropriated by Linnæus to the allied Gemsbok of
Southern Africa. The fact is that most of the early authors had no
clear ideas as to the distinctive characters of the present animal,
and habitually confounded it both with the Beatrix of Arabia and the
Gemsbok of the Cape.
The earliest travellers of modern days to meet with the Leucoryx in
its native wilds and to transmit perfect specimens of it home to
Europe were the well-known German naturalists Hemprich and Ehrenberg,
who explored Nubia, Arabia, and the adjoining countries from 1820 to
1825. Unfortunately Lichtenstein, who first described and figured
their specimens of this Antelope about the year 1827, chose to
identify it with the _Antilope leucoryx_ of Pallas and to employ
Pallas’s name for it. In the ‘Symbolæ Physicæ,’ in which Hemprich and
Ehrenberg’s own account of their expedition was given to the world in
1828, Lichtenstein’s example of using _Antilope leucoryx_ as the
scientific name of the present species was followed.
Hemprich and Ehrenberg state that they had originally intended to
have called this species _Antilope ensicornis_, but that they
eventually gave up their proposed designation for the term adopted by
Lichtenstein. The same was the case also with nearly all the leading
authorities subsequent to Lichtenstein, so that to attempt to restore
the name “_leucoryx_” to what is probably its proper owner would
now only create confusion. We prefer therefore to designate the
present species as _Oryx leucoryx_ (Licht.), to which name it is
undoubtedly entitled.
After giving an accurate description of the present animal, and figures
of the two specimens brought home, which, although of not first-rate
quality, are perfectly recognizable, Hemprich and Ehrenberg inform us
that they met with it in Dongola, between Ambukol on the Upper Nile and
Simrie near Chor-el-Lebben, where they hunted it along with the Arabs
on horseback.
In Dongola and Kordofan, they proceed to tell us, this Antelope is
met with in herds in the deserts. Its flesh is much appreciated by
the Arabs, and is dried and laid by for future use, being likewise
often sold in the markets. Its skins are used for shields and sandals,
but are not considered of first-rate quality for these purposes.
The Arabs of the Kubabish tribe, they inform us, call this Antelope
“_Abu-harb_,” and state that it lives chiefly on the leaves and
twigs of the acacias (_Acacia textilis_ and _A. ehrenbergi_)
which are found in the valleys of the desert in this district.
The next great explorer of North-eastern Africa, Rüppell, does not
add much to our knowledge of the present species, which, in his list
of Antelopes in the ‘Neue Wirbelthiere,’ he tells us, lives in herds
in the deserts of Nubia and also in Egypt proper, as far north as
the borders of the Fayoum. He comments, however, upon its confusion
by Lichtenstein with the _A. leucoryx_ of Pallas, and calls it
_Antilope algazella_, after Buffon.
Our third leading authority on North-African mammals, Theodor von
Heuglin, informs us that the Leucoryx was only met with by him in
Southern Nubia and Kordofan, and in the oasis of El-Kāb, west of
Dongola. But, according to the Central-African traveller Nachtigal,
the range of this species extends into Borgu and Tibeste, while Barth
in 1850 met with it in the hills of Air or Asben, north of Agades, in
about 19° N. lat. and 9° E. long.
Proceeding still further westward, we may state that there can be
little doubt that the Leucoryx was formerly met with in the southern
part of Tunisia, although at the present epoch it seems to be nearly,
if not quite, extinct in the Beylik. When Sclater was in Tunis in 1898
he observed a stuffed specimen of a young Leucoryx Antelope in the
palace of the Bey at Marsa, and was told that it had been originally
received alive from the southern frontiers of Tunisia (see P.Z.S. 1898,
p. 280).
In the Musée Alaoui, at the Bardo Palace, Tunis, Sclater was also shown
an unmistakable figure of a Leucoryx attacked by a Lion, represented on
a piece of Roman mosaic pavement. Of this figure Sir Harry Johnston has
kindly furnished us with the accompanying sketch (fig. 92, p. 48).
The mosaic pavement in question, which was discovered among the remains
of a Roman villa in the vicinity of Tunis, contains representations of
various animals of the chase found in that district in Roman times.
The _Gætulus Oryx_ of Juvenal (Sat. xi. 140) was therefore in all
probability the Leucoryx.
We are not aware of any authentic records of the occurrence of the
Leucoryx on the southern frontiers of Algeria and Morocco, where,
in recent times, it has probably been driven far into the interior.
But when we go on as far west as Senegal and Nigeria it would appear
that the Leucoryx, or a form so closely allied to it as to be barely
distinguishable, is still abundant in the Senegambian deserts, and is
also, according to Capt. Mockler-Ferryman, met with on the Nile in the
vicinity of Lokoja.
[Illustration:
Fig. 92.
A Leucoryx attacked by a Lion.
]
The first specimen of the Leucoryx received from Senegal was, so far
as we know, that figured by Geoffroy St.-Hilaire and F. Cuvier in 1819
in the ‘Histoire Naturelle des Mammifères’ (plate 376), which was then
living in the Jardin des Plantes. This, we are told, was an adult male,
standing about four feet high to the top of its head, and having long
and well-developed horns.
When the thirteenth Earl of Derby formed his great menagerie at
Knowsley between 1835 and 1850, the group of the Leucoryx Antelopes was
one of the specialities of the collection. The adult male and female
were figured by Waterhouse Hawkins in plate xvii. of the ‘Gleanings,’
and the young one, born at Knowsley, forms one of the figures in plate
xvi. of the same work.
[Illustration:
Fig. 93.
Young Leucoryx.
(From ‘Zoological Sketches.’)
]
Lord Derby obtained his first female Leucoryx in 1837, but it was not
until the retirement of Mr. Cross from the Surrey Zoological Gardens
and the consequent dispersal of that collection, some six or seven
years afterwards, that he succeeded in acquiring a male. Owing to the
age of the female at that time, although she bred twice with the male
she failed to rear her offspring, and died in 1846, being then, as
Lord Derby believed, the only female of this species in England. When
the Derby Menagerie was dispersed in August 1851, the pair of Leucoryx
Antelopes were among the animals selected by the Zoological Society
of London, in virtue of Lord Derby’s bequest to them, and became the
foundation of a stock which flourished for many years in the Regent’s
Park Gardens. Young ones were bred of this pair or of their descendants
in 1852, 1853, 1860, and 1864. Fresh examples of the Leucoryx were
obtained by the Society in 1870 and 1880, and in 1881 a fine female was
brought home and presented to the Menagerie by the late Mr. John M.
Cook, F.Z.S.
This Antelope has not done so well in the Regent’s Park of late
years, but there is still one example of it living in the Menagerie,
obtained last year, and it is hoped that a breeding pair may soon be
re-established. An excellent figure of the adults of both sexes of
the Leucoryx Antelope, drawn by Wolf from the Zoological Society’s
specimens, was published in the first volume of Wolf and Sclater’s
‘Zoological Sketches.’ In the second volume of the same work a young
one, likewise drawn by the same skilful artist, is represented on plate
xix. The calf in question was born in 1851, and was about six months
old when Mr. Wolfs water-colour drawing (from which fig. 93, p. 49, has
been taken) was prepared.
Lord Derby’s stock of the Leucoryx is said to have been received from
Nubia, while others in the Zoological Society’s Gardens came from
Senegal.
We have not been able to recognize any difference between animals from
these two countries, although they have been separated as distinct
local forms (_nubica_ and _senegalensis_) by Wagner, and more
recently by Herr Matschie as different species.
There are at present no complete specimens of this Antelope in the
British Museum, and skins of it fit for mounting both from Dongola and
from Senegal are much required, in order that a strict comparison of
examples from these widely distant localities may be made. The series
now in the National Collection consists only of a mounted skeleton
formerly in the Zoological Society’s Museum, a skin and skull of a
young one from Sennaar, and some skulls and horns.
Our Plate of this Antelope (Plate LXXXI.), which represents both sexes,
was drawn on stone by Mr. Smit from a sketch prepared by Mr. Wolf,
and probably represents the same animals as the plate in ‘Zoological
Sketches’ above referred to.
_May,_ 1899.
[Illustration:
THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. LXXXII
_Wolf del. Smit lith._
_Hanhart imp._
The Beatrix Antelope.
ORYX BEATRIX.
_Published by R. H. Porter._
]
114. THE BEATRIX ANTELOPE.
ORYX BEATRIX, Gray.
[PLATE LXXXII.]
_Gazellæ Indicta cornu singulare_, =Pallas=, Nov. Comm. Ac. Petrop.
xiii. p. 470, pl. x. fig. 5 (1769).
_Antilope leucoryx_, =Pallas=, Spic. Zool. xii. p. 17 (1777); =Herm.=
Tab. Affin. Anim. p. 108 (1783); =Zimm.= Geogr. Ges. ii. p. 108
(1780), iii. p. 269 (1783); =Schreb.= Säug. pl. cclvi. B (1784);
=Bodd.= Elench. Anim. p. 139 (1785); =Gmel.= Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p.
190 (1788); =Kerr=, Linn. An. K. p. 316 (1792); =Donnd.= Zool. Beytr.
i. p. 639 (1792); =Link=, Beytr. Nat. ii. p. 99 (1795); =Bechst.=
Syst. Uebers. vierf. Th. ii. p. 641 (1800); =Shaw=, Gen. Zool. ii. pt.
2, p. 359 (1801); =Turt.= Linn. S. N. i. p. 115 (1806); =Desm.= N.
Dict. d’H. N. (1) xvii. p. 132 (1803), xxiv. Tabl. p. 32 (1804); =G.
Cuv.= Dict. Sci. Nat. ii. p. 237 (1804); =Tiedem.= Zool. i. p. 408
(1808); =Thunb.= Mém. Acad. Pétersb. iii. p. 313 (1811); =G. Fisch.=
Zoogn. iii. p. 425 (1814); =Afz.= N. Act. Ups. vii. p. 219 (1815);
=Desm.= N. Dict. d’H. N. (2) ii. p. 204 (1816); =G. Cuv.= R. A. i. p.
262 (1817); =Goldf.= Schr. Säug. v. p. 1180 (1818); =Schinz=, Cuv.
Thierr. i. p. 391 (1821); =Desm.= Mamm. ii. p. 474 (1822); =Desmoul.=
Dict. Class. d’H. N. i. p. 444 (1822); =H. Sm.= Griff. An. K. iv. p.
186, v. p. 326 (1827); =Rüpp.= N. Wirbelth. p. 16 (1835); =Pearson=,
J. As. Soc. Bengal, ix. p. 519 (1840).
_Leucoryx Antelope_, =Penn.= Quadr. i. p. 68 (1781); id. ibid. 1793, p.
76 (not fig.).
_Antilope (Bubalis) oryx_, =Licht.= Mag. nat. Freund, vi. p. 156 (1814).
_Cemas oryx_, =Oken=, Lehrb. Nat. iii. pt. 2, p. 734 (1816).
_Cerophorus (Oryx) leucoryx_, =De Blainville=, Bull. Soc. Philom. 1816,
p. 75.
_Antilope besoarctica_, =Jard.= Nat. Misc. (1) vii. p. 203 (1842);
=Reichenb.= Säug. iii. p. 120, pl. xxxvii. (1845).
_Antilope ensicornis_, var. α _asiatica_, =Wagner=, Schr. Säug. Suppl.
v. p. 437 (1855).
_Oryx beatrix_, =Gray=, P.Z.S. 1857, p. 157, pl. lv.; =id.= Cat. Rum. B.
M. p. 36 (1872); =id.= Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 112 (1873); =Sclater=,
P.Z.S. 1872, p. 603; =St. John=, P.Z.S. 1874, p. 95; =Sclater=, P.Z.S.
1881, p. 819; =id.= List An. Z. S. (8) p. 138 (1883), (9) p. 159
(1896); =W. Sclater=, Cat. Mamm. Calc. Mus. ii. p. 156 (1891); =Flow.
& Lyd.= Mamm. p. 344 (1891); =Ward=, Horn Meas. (1) p. 148 (1892), (2)
p. 188 (1896); =Lyd.= Horns and Hoofs, p. 249 (1893); =Matsch.= SB.
nat. Freund. 1893, p. 104; =Thomas=, P.Z.S. 1894, p. 451;
=Pousargues=, Ann. Sci. Nat. (7) iv. p. 131 (1896); =Trouessart=, Cat.
Mamm. fasc. iv. p. 955 (1898).
_Antilope beatrix_, =Huet=, Bull. Soc. Acclim. (4) ix. p. 61 (1887).
_Oryx Leucoryx Pallasi_, =Fitz.= SB. Wien, lix. p. 178 (1869).
Vernacular Names:—_El Walrush_ and _El Bukrus_ of Bahrein Arabs
(_Pennant_).
Height at withers about 35 inches. Prevailing colour of body, neck, and
head a dirty white, slightly darker on the haunches. On the face the
frontal and nasal patches are brown in colour and sometimes separated
from each other; the brown stripe that passes from the eye unites
with the stripe that arises near the base of the ear to form on the
cheek a large patch which extends below the jaw and joins across the
inter-ramal area with the corresponding patch of the opposite side;
from this patch a narrow brown stripe runs along the throat, and is
traceable as far as the chest, which is also brown. Ears whitish; the
tip and edges not black or brown. Mane on neck whitish like the rest
of the body, and there is no median dorsal black stripe. Tail white;
the tuft black at the end. Fore leg from the shoulder, and hind leg
from the thigh, deep brown, both on the outer and inner side down to
the fetlocks; pasterns white. A faint brown longitudinal stripe is
traceable on each side between the belly and the flanks. Hair along
spine reversed from rump.
Horns long, straight, attaining a length of about 25 inches; ribbed for
about two-thirds of their length; the ribs small and close-set.
_Female._ Similar to the male, and horns equally long or longer.
_Hab._ Southern Arabia, to the shores of Persian Gulf.
As we have already pointed out, it is highly probable, if not certain,
that the _Antilope leucoryx_ of Pallas and his immediate
successors was the present species and not the preceding, which,
however, is now universally known as “The Leucoryx.” In the description
of his _Antilope leucoryx_ (which forms the sixteenth species
in his second memoir on the genus _Antilope_ published in 1777)
Pallas affords us so little information that not much can be made of
it. He gives “Arabia, and perhaps Libya,” as its locality, and adds
references to the passage in the ‘Cynegetica’ of Oppian which we have
already quoted, and to “_Gazellæ Indicæ cornu singulare_”—a
“curious horn of an Indian Gazelle” which he had described in a former
memoir on some fossil bones from Siberia. On referring to this memoir,
and to the figure by which it is accompanied, we cannot say that we
are by any means satisfied that the “curious horn” in question, which
is remarkable for its length and slenderness (33 inches long, as given
by Pallas) and for its numerous annulations, belonged to the present
species. We will, however, go so far as to allow that it may possibly
have done so. At any rate we must admit that it could hardly have been
a horn of the Antelope which we now call the Leucoryx.
The second original authority to describe the present species was our
countryman Pennant in his ‘History of Quadrupeds,’ where he gives
the “Leucoryx” as the fifth species of his genus “Antelope.” Pennant
based his Leucoryx mainly upon “two drawings of animals in the British
Museum, taken from life in 1712 by order of Sir John Lock, Agent of
the East India Company at Ispahan; they were preserved as rarities by
the Shah of Persia in a park eight leagues from the capital.” Pennant
informs us that he had copied his description of these animals from a
paper accompanying the drawings. This species, he tells us, inhabits
“Gaw Behrein, an island in the Gulf of Bassorah,” meaning, no doubt,
what we now call Bahrein Island in the Persian Gulf. Judging from the
description and locality it would appear that Pennant’s “Leucoryx”
of 1781 was intended for the present Antelope, but the figure in the
edition of Pennant’s work of 1793, it must be allowed, gives one rather
the idea of a Beisa (_Oryx beisa_).
As regards the other authors which we have quoted above as following
Pallas in calling this animal _Antilope leucoryx_, it is not
necessary to take much trouble about them. They merely repeat the
stories of their predecessors without adding anything original
thereto, and seem to have had no true ideas of the distinctness of
the present species from its allies. It was not, in fact, until 1857
that the present Antelope became properly known to science in Europe
by the receipt of living specimens. The first of these was brought
from Bombay to England in that year and presented to the Zoological
Society of London by Capt. John Shepherd. This animal, which was at
first supposed to be a half-grown specimen of the Gemsbok of the Cape,
quickly attracted the notice of the late Dr. J. E. Gray, of the
British Museum, who had a capital eye for strange mammals of all sorts.
Dr. Gray immediately recognized it as belonging to a species unknown
to him, and, having apparently no suspicion that it was possibly the
veritable “Leucoryx” of the older authors, described it as new at a
Scientific Meeting of the Zoological Society held on June 23rd of
that year, at which Sclater (then recently elected a member of the
Council) well recollects having been himself present, and proposed to
call it _Oryx beatrix_, after H.R.H. The Princess Beatrice. Dr.
Gray’s description, published in the ‘Proceedings,’ is accompanied by
an excellent coloured figure of the Beatrix Antelope drawn by Wolf.
Dr. Gray conjectured that the specimen had been brought to Bombay from
the shores of the Red Sea, but it is more probable that it was carried
there from the Persian Gulf. The typical specimen, which died shortly
afterwards, was deposited in the British Museum.
In March 1872 a second specimen of the Beatrix Antelope was received by
the Zoological Society, and fortunately with sufficient information to
solve the enigma as to its real _patria_. It was the survivor of a
pair of these animals, obtained for the late Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, F.Z.S.,
by Col. Pelly, then British Resident at Bushire on the Persian Gulf. In
1878 a third living specimen of this Antelope, a male, was received by
the Zoological Society; this was presented by Commander F. M. Burke,
of the B.I.S.N.S.S. ‘Arcot,’ by whom it had been obtained at Jeddah in
the Red Sea from a friend who had received it as a present from the
Shereif of Mecca. It was stated to have been originally captured in the
neighbourhood of Tyeff or Tayf, in the Hedjaz Passes, some 150 miles
east of the Red Sea. In 1881 two additional specimens of the Beatrix
Antelope were presented to the same Society by the late Lord Lilford,
and since that date three other examples of the same animal have been
received alive by the Zoological Society. These were a pair presented
by Col. E. C. Ross, C.S.I., H.B.M. Consul at Bushire, in 1890, and a
single female presented by Lt.-Col. Talbot in 1892.
The typical specimen of _Oryx beatrix_, as already mentioned, is
in the collection of the British Museum, as is also the adult female
transmitted to the Zoological Society by Col. Pelly. Besides these, the
National Collection possesses a skeleton of a young female obtained
on the Persian Gulf by Mr. B. T. ffinch, F.Z.S., and some skins and
skulls collected in Muscat by Dr. A. S. G. Jayakar, C.M.Z.S. Specimens
of the Beatrix Antelope are, however, excessively rare in European
collections, and we are not aware that any of the continental museums
have succeeded in obtaining specimens of it.
From what has been stated it is evident that the range of the Beatrix
Antelope reaches from the shores of the Red Sea across Southern Arabia
to Muscat. How far up the coast of the Persian Gulf it extends is
uncertain, but the specimens stated by Pennant to have been brought to
Ispahan from the Bahrein Islands had probably been obtained from the
opposite mainland.
Our figure of this Antelope (Plate LXXXII.) was put upon the stone by
Mr. Smit from a sketch prepared under Sir Victor Brooke’s directions
by Mr. J. Wolf. This was _probably_ taken from the same animal
as that figured in the Zoological Society’s ‘Proceedings,’ as above
mentioned.
_May_, 1899.
[Illustration:
THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. LXXXIII.
_Wolf del. Smit lith._
_Hanhart imp._
The Gemsbok.
ORYX GAZELLA.
_Published by R. H. Porter._
]
115. THE GEMSBOK.
ORYX GAZELLA (Linn.).