Genus I. COBUS.

Type.
Kobus, A. Smith, Ill. Zool. S. Afr. pt. xii. pl. xxviii. (1840)C. ellipsiprymnus.
Kolus, Gray, List Mamm. B. M. p. 159 (1843)C. defassa.
Adenota, Gray, P. Z. S. 1850, p. 129C. kob.
Hydrotragus, Fitz. Sitz. Ak. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p. 175 (1869).“Adenota kul, Heuglin.”
Onotragus, Gray, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 17 (1872)C. lechee.

Size large. Horns (in male only) long, sublyrate, and ringed for the greater part of their length. Suborbital gland rudimentary. Skull with a deep hollow in the middle of the forehead; no lachrymal depression; a large lachrymal fissure; and the premaxillæ reaching the very long nasals. Tail long, reaching to the hocks, with a ridge of hair on the upper surface, and tufted at the end.

Distribution. Africa south of the Atlas.

Under Cobus, the proper Latin form of Sir Andrew Smith’s term Kobus (taken, no doubt, from the so-called “Kob” Antelope), we follow Flower and Lydekker in uniting the genera Cobus, Adenota, and Hydrotragus of some authors.

The group thus formed contains 11 species which may be arranged in two sections as follows:—

Section I. (Cobus).

Larger in size; fur grizzled; neck maned.

Section II. (Adenota).

Size smaller; fur above uniform rufous; neck not maned.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXII.

J. Smit del & lith.

Hanhart imp.

The Common Waterbuck.

COBUS ELLIPSIPRYMNUS.

Published by R. H. Porter.

58. THE COMMON WATERBUCK.
COBUS ELLIPSIPRYMNUS (Ogilby).
[PLATE XXXII.]

Antilope ellipsiprymnus, Ogilby, P. Z. S. 1833, p. 47; id. Penny Enc. ii. p. 88 (1834); Wagn. Schr. Säug. iv. p. 432 (1843); id. op. cit. v. p. 434; Peters, Säug. Mossamb. p. 189 (1852) (Zambesia).

Aigocerus ellipsiprymnus, Harr. Wild Anim. S. Afr. p. 71, pl. xiv. (1840); id. Wild Sport S. Afr. p. 387 (1838), ed. 5, p. 351 (1852).

Kobus ellipsiprymnus, Smith, Ill. Zool. S. Afr., Mamm. pls. xxviii. & xxix. (1840); Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. (1) xviii. p. 232 (1846); id. P. Z. S. 1850, p. 130; id. Knowsl. Men. p. 15 (1850); id. Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 99 (1852); id. Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 15 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. p. 86 (1873); id. Ann. Mag. N. H. (3) iv. p. 296 (1859) (White Nile, Petherick); Gerrard, Cat. Bones Mamm. B. M. p. 239 (1862); Scl. P. Z. S. 1864, p. 101 (Uzaramo, Speke); Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p. 176 (1869); Drummond, Large Game S. Afr. p. 426 (1875); Brehm, Thierl. iii. p. 224, fig. (animal) (1880); Flow. & Gars. Cat. Ost. Coll. Surg. p. 268 (1884); Jent. Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, ix.) p. 131 (1887); id. Cat. Mamm. Leyd. Mus. (op. cit. xi.) p. 159 (1892); id. N. L. M. ix. p. 172 (1887); Nicolls & Egl. Sportsm. S. Afr. p. 44 (1892); True, Pr. U. S. N. M. xv. p. 471 (Taveta, B. E. A.) (1892).

Antilope (Aigoceros) ellipsiprymna, Less. N. Tabl. R. A., Mamm. p. 180 (1842).

Kobus ellipsiprymnus, Gray, List Mamm. B. M. p. 159 (1843).

Aigoceros ellipsiprymnus, A. Smith, S. Afr. Q. J. ii. p. 186 (1835).

Cervicapra ellipsiprymnus, Sund. Pecora, K. Vet.-Ak. Handl. 1844, p. 195 (1846); id. Hornschuch’s Transl., Arch. Skand. Beitr. ii. p. 147 (1848).

Heleotragus ellipsiprymnus, Kirk, P. Z. S. 1864, p. 658 (Zambesia).

Cobus ellipsiprymnus, Buckley, P. Z. S. 1876, p. 284; Selous, P. Z. S. 1881, p. 758; id. Hunter’s Wanderings, p. 218 (1881); Crawshay, P. Z. S. 1890, p. 651 (Nyasaland); Hunter, in Willoughby’s E. Afr. p. 288 (1889); Scl. P. Z. S. 1891, p. 326, 1892, p. 471, 1893, p. 505, pl. xxxix. (female from life and young), et p. 727; Flow. & Lyd. Mamm. p. 340 (1891); Lyd. Field, lxxvii. p. 980 (1891); id. Horns and Hoofs, p. 223 (1893); Ward, Horn Meas. p. 86 (1892); Thomas, P. Z. S. 1893, p. 504; Bryden, Gun and Camera, p. 504 (1893); Barkley, P. Z. S. 1894, p. 131; Swayne, P. Z. S. 1894, p. 316 (Somaliland); id. Somaliland, p. 307; Matschie, Thierw. Ost-Afr. Säugeth. p. 123, fig. (animal) (1895).

Cobus, sp. inc., Scl. P. Z. S. 1892, p. 118 (Somaliland).

Vernacular Names:—Waterbuck of the English at the Cape and elsewhere; Kringgat or Waterbok of the Dutch; Tumoga of the Bechuanas; Sidumuga of the Amandebele; Ee-tumaha of the Makalakas; Ee-kulo of the Masubias; Umkulamdumbo of the Makubas; Mukulo of the Batongas; Gwelung-gwelee of the Masaras (according to Selous); Nakodzwi or Nyakodzwi of the Ajawa and of the Anyanja; Ipiva of the Angoni; Chuzu of the Achewa, Atonga, Atembuka, Ahenga, and Anyika; and Lipuwa of the Ankonde in Nyasaland (Crawshay); Kulu, Kuru, or Kuro of the Swahilis (Neumann); Balanka of the Adone Negroes; Balango of the Somalis (Swayne).

Height about 39 inches; length of body 43 inches. Fur long and coarse, on back blackish, hairs whitish at the base; paler on the flanks, and passing into white on the middle line of the belly and on the inner sides of the hind limbs. A conspicuous white line across the rump reaches down to the inside of the flanks on both sides. Feet dark brown, with a white line round the hoofs and across the upper edge of the false hoofs, which are distinct. Sides of face and forehead dark brown, nose black; muffle moist, naked, black; line round the nose, lips, and chin, and line over the eye extending in front of eye, white. Irregular line round the neck greyish white. Ears hairy, inside white, outside black, brownish at the base, about 7½ inches long. Tail dark brown, beneath white, about 11 inches long, hair beyond 4 inches.

Horns large and strong, lengthened, sublyrate, inclined backwards and then forwards at the tips; strongly ringed in front for three-fourths from their bases.

Female similar, but hornless; teats 4.

Hab. South Africa, from the Limpopo northwards, and along the coast through Nyasaland to German and British East Africa and to the Shebeyli River in Somaliland.

The Waterbuck, which is readily known from all the allied Antelopes by the white ribbon which passes over the rump and is carried down to the thighs on both sides, has, as we shall presently show, an extensive distribution in Africa, but was first described from a specimen obtained in the interior of South Africa. One of the early African travellers—Steedman—met with it in 1832 “about 25 days’ journey north of the Orange River between Latakoo and the western coast.” This somewhat vague locality, which was given by Ogilby when he described Steedman’s specimen before the Zoological Society in March 1833, probably indicates some part of Damaraland.

In 1840 Sir Cornwallis Harris figured this species—not, we must allow, very accurately—in his great work on the ‘Game and Wild Animals of South Africa.’ Although not found within the limits of Cape-land proper, the Waterbuck, Harris tells us, abounded in his days on the margins of the willow-grown Limpopo and its tributaries, in the “rippling waters of which it delights to lave its grizzled sides, immersing itself up to the chin during the heat of the day and rolling in its favourite soiling-pool for hours together.”

Sir Andrew Smith, who visited South Africa about the same period, likewise figures both sexes of this Antelope in his ‘Illustrations of the Zoology of South Africa,’ and not perhaps in a more satisfactory manner. He gives, however, a good description of both sexes of the Waterbuck and of its internal anatomy, together with an account of its habits, from which we extract the following particulars:—“This animal, which has, from the time it first became known to the Cape colonists, been designated by them under the name of ‘The Water Bok,’ was not seen by our party till after we had passed to the northward of Kurrichane; and, if we are to trust the evidence of the natives, it is never met with to the southward of the high lands which extend to the eastward of the locality mentioned. To the northward, however, it is a common animal, and is generally found associated in small herds of from eight to ten individuals, near the margins of streams. We were struck from the first with the small proportion of males in these herds, and on remarking upon the circumstance to the aborigines, they gave their testimony in support of the accuracy of our observations. Rarely, in a herd of twelve, were there more than two or three males, and of these seldom more than one which might be regarded as mature. The natives were of opinion that the sexes were produced in about that proportion, and even made use of the assumed fact in support of the propriety of polygamy as it exists among uncivilized men, asserting that a like disproportion occurred in the human species.

“When Cobus ellipsiprymnus is feeding it has the appearance of being a clumsy and unprepossessing animal; but, on the contrary, when excited, it is elegant and stately. At such times it holds its head high, and assumes a lively and spirited position. Its pace is a gallop, and generally all the individuals of the herd rush off at the same time, each making the best of its way without endeavouring, as some other of the Antelopes do, to follow in the train of a leader. When disturbed they generally fly from the places where they are discovered towards the higher grounds of the neighbourhood, and if unable to reach them, without passing through water, they manifest neither fear nor disinclination to plunge into the stream—hence the origin of the name by which they are designated by the colonist. Their flesh is in little repute, even with the aborigines, though it is not quite rejected; the dislike to it arises from its being of a hard and stringy texture, and from exhaling a strong urinous odour.”

As regards the present distribution of the Waterbuck in South Africa, we learn from Messrs. Nicolls and Eglington that this stately Antelope is now only rarely met with in some of the unfrequented districts on the northern confines of the Transvaal in the neighbourhood of the Crocodile River and in the low country towards Delagoa Bay. On the coast-lands between the Crocodile River and the Zambesi, as also along the Zambesi itself, and in most of the streams of northern Matabeleland, these authors tell us it is still plentiful. In the low country to the north of Delagoa Bay traversed by Mr. F. V. Kirby, F.Z.S., the Waterbuck, as he informs us in his ‘Haunts of Wild Game,’ is perhaps the commonest Antelope. “It is there everywhere met with along the banks of rivers and streams, and in and about rough stony kopjes near to water, in considerable troops, sometimes as many as forty running together.” Mr. Selous, in his “Notes on African Antelopes,” published in the Zoological Society’s ‘Proceedings’ for 1881, tells us that at that date the Waterbuck was still found on the Upper Limpopo and its tributaries, and on the Zambesi and on all its affluents eastwards of the Victoria Falls was very plentiful. Mr. Selous states that it is most partial to steep stony hills, and is often found at a distance of more than a mile from the nearest river, to which, however, it always makes when pursued. “Though a heavy-looking beast it can clamber with wonderful speed and sureness of foot up and down the steepest hillsides.”

In some notes on the Antelopes of the Transvaal, kindly furnished to us by Mr. H. M. Barber, the Waterbuck is spoken of as follows:—“This Antelope is perhaps the most common of all, being widely dispersed over the whole of Eastern Africa. At Beira and up the Pungwe River they are indeed plentiful, and are to be seen in large droves, often sixty and a hundred together. From the month of March till August the old bulls are usually separated from the cows, and I have seen as many as fifteen in a troop, yet single bulls are also very frequently found. These creatures all resort to the reeds and rushes and marshes at night to feed, and are very easily shot at daylight when thus occupied. Shortly after sunrise they usually stray away from the river to higher ground, where a clear view can be got all round so as to see any approaching enemy.

“It is not uncommon to find single bulls hidden in thickets either on the river banks or some distance away. When thus hidden they will often allow one to approach to within a few yards before breaking cover. If not much frightened they mostly trot away, and as a rule do not go very far before stopping, thus giving the hunter a chance of approaching them again. The Beira Waterbuck has by no means such large horns as those further down the coast on the Olifants River, near Delagoa Bay, and their horns have the peculiarity of being more upright and closer together.

“From the habits of these creatures they fall an easy prey to lions and leopards, who seem to live principally upon them. Their flesh is very coarse and stringy, and is only eaten by the hunter when nothing better can be got.”

Passing to the north of the Zambesi we find Mr. Crawshay recording the Waterbuck as by far the commonest of the Antelopes which go in herds in Nyasaland; all over the Protectorate, he says, this Antelope is plentiful both on the east and west coast of the Lake and on the plains of the Shiré River. Mr. Crawshay adds the following particulars as to its habits in Nyasaland:—“Waterbuck are always found in greatest numbers on large swampy plains overgrown with coarse grass, tall reeds, and papyrus, where in the wet season it is almost impossible to get at them. Unlike other Antelopes, except the Reedbuck, they do not appear to leave the lowlands in the rains, but keep to the plains all the year round; apparently they revel in almost impassable swamps, where only Elephants, Buffaloes, and Reedbucks care to stay, and I have occasionally followed them in mud and water almost waist-deep. In such places one has to undergo cruel torture from reed-cuts and mosquitoes, the latter of the fiercest type and even in broad noonday most vicious. Nature has provided the Waterbuck with a tougher hide and coarser hair than any other of its kind; but even these are not proof against the rank tall ‘mabandi’ grass and spear-like ‘matele’ reeds, and I have noticed that the legs of some of those that I have killed have suffered considerably, the skin on the fetlocks and pasterns being cut clean through.”

Proceeding northwards to German East Africa we find Cobus ellipsiprymnus included in Matschie’s volume on the Mammals of that colony. Herr Neumann has transmitted specimens to Berlin from Tanga, and Herr von Höhnel is given as an authority for its occurrence on the Pangani. Speke also met with it in Uzaramo, where it was numerous in the jungles along the Kingani River. In British East Africa, as we are told by Mr. Jackson, the Waterbuck is common everywhere south of Lake Baringo near fresh water, and is also found on many of the saltwater creeks on the coast. It is particularly plentiful on the banks of the Tana River, and in the Kilimanjaro district, where Sir John Willoughby and his party (see ‘East Africa and its Big Game’) and Dr. Abbott also met with it. “Like most bush-loving Antelopes,” Mr. Jackson says, “it is fairly easy to stalk, but is a very tough beast, and takes a good deal of killing, if not hit in the right place. Its flesh, though much relished by the natives, is coarse and rank—indeed that of an old bull is almost uneatable.” Mr. Gedge, who was at one time Mr. Jackson’s companion in East Africa, writes to us that on one occasion in Buddu, a province of Uganda, he fell in with, and shot, a solitary buck of this species, of a light, almost fawn-colour, and adds that their colour varies from a light brown to an almost dark slate in different localities. He considers it one of the commonest Antelopes in British East Africa. In Somaliland the Waterbuck was found on the Webbe Shabeleh by Capt. Swayne and Col. Arthur Paget in the spring of 1894. In his excellent volume on his Somali journeys Captain Swayne tells us that he found it very plentiful all along the banks of the river as far as he followed the stream. “They lie up in the dense forest which clothes both banks along the water’s edge, and go out to feed in herds on the open grass-flats outside the belts of forest.”

Whether the Waterbuck of the White Nile, referred by Gray and Heuglin to Cobus ellipsiprymnus, is of this species or belongs to C. defassa, is perhaps a little doubtful. We should be inclined to think that the latter reference is more likely to be correct.

In European menageries the Waterbuck is not usually to be met with, though there have been occasional specimens in some of the gardens in Holland and Germany. Sclater saw a pair at Amsterdam in June last. The Zoological Society of London received their first specimen of this Antelope (a male) in June 1890, and a female in May 1891. Both of these animals were obtained in British East Africa, and were presented to the Society by Mr. G. S. Mackenzie, F.Z.S. In 1893 the pair bred and a young female was born in the Menagerie on the 4th May, furnishing, so far as is known, the first instance of this animal having reproduced in captivity. The mother and young were figured by Smit in the Society’s ‘Proceedings’ for 1893, and the figures are repeated in our Plate XXXII., where a head of the male of the same pair is also introduced in the background.

In the British Museum will be found a fine mounted pair of this Antelope from Mashonaland (Selous), and a good series of skulls from various localities, amongst which are examples from Nyasaland (Sir H. H. Johnston) and from the banks of the Webbe in Somaliland (Swayne).

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXIII.

J. Smit del. & lith.

Hanhart imp.

The Sing-sing.

COBUS UNCTUOSUS.

Published by R. H. Porter.

59. THE SING-SING.
COBUS UNCTUOSUS (Laurill.).
[PLATE XXXIII.]

Cervus sing-sing, Bennett, Rep. Counc. Z. S. L. 1832, p. 5 (nom. nud.).

Antilope sing-sing, Waterh. Cat. Mamm. Z. S. L. p. 41 (1838).

Antilope koba, Ogilby, Penny Cycl. i. p. 79 (1834); id. P. Z. S. 1836, p. 103 (nec Erxl.).

Antilope unctuosa, Laurillard, Diet. Un. d’H. N. i. p. 622 (1847); Wagn. Schreb. Säug. iv. p. 434 (1843).

Antilope defassa, var. senegalensis, Wagn. Säug. v. p. 435 (1855).

Kolus sing-sing, Gray, List Mamm. B. M. p. 159 (1843).

Kobus sing-sing, Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. (1) xviii. p. 232 (1846); id. Knowsl. Men. p. 15 (1850); id. P. Z. S. 1850, p. 131; id. Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 99 (1852); id. Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 15 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 87 (1873); Gerrard, Cat. Bones, p. 239.

Cobus sing-sing, Scl. Cat. Vert. p. 144 (1883).

Adenota sing-sing, Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p. 174 (1869).

Cobus defassus, Lyd. Horns and Hoofs, p. 224 (1893).

Cobus defassa, Scl. P. Z. S. 1892, p. 471.

Cobus unctuosus, Scl. P. Z. S. 1893, p. 727.

Vernacular Name:—Sing-sing of the natives on the Gambia (Whitfield).

Height at shoulder from 39 to 45 inches. Body above sandy brown, hairs beneath whitish; flanks rather browner, in contrast to the conspicuous white rump. Upper part of the ears outside and their rims blackish, inside filled with long white hairs. Hairs of neck long and thin, rather paler in colour than the back. Front of face brown like the back, but rather darker; eye-stripe, line round the naked black muzzle, and chin white. Inner sides of limbs white. Feet below the knees blackish, with slight white lines round the hoofs. Tail thin, above brown like the back, beneath white, tip black; length about 14 inches.

Horns rising backwards nearly in a line with the forehead, then turning upwards, strongly ringed; length along the curve about 26 inches.

Female. Similar to male but hornless, and slightly smaller in size.

Hab. Senegal and Gambia.

The Sing-sing of Western Africa appears to have first come to the notice of European naturalists in the year 1831, when a living pair of this Antelope were brought to England, of which one, we are told, went to the Surrey Zoological Gardens, and the other to the Zoological Society’s collection in Regent’s Park. In the ‘Report of the Council of the Zoological Society,’ read at the Anniversary Meeting in 1832, this animal is entered in the list of mammals exhibited in the Society’s Gardens (drawn up, we believe, by Mr. Bennett) as the “Sing-sing Deer (Cervus sing-sing)” In Waterhouse’s Catalogue of the Mammals in the Society’s Museum published in 1838, the same animal (then in the Museum) is entered more correctly as “Antilope sing-sing” but the specific term is attributed to “Ogilby.” In neither case, however, was any description added to the specific name. It is curious also that Ogilby, to whom the specific term “sing-sing” is attributed by Waterhouse, in his article upon Antelopes published in 1834 in the first volume of the ‘Penny Cyclopædia,’ did not use this name, but referred the animal in question, of which a very fair figure was given, to the “Koba” of Buffon, and called it “Antilope koba.” Ogilby appears to have taken the same view in his remarks on certain Antelopes published in the Zoological Society’s ‘Proceedings’ for 1836; but the “Koba” of Buffon, as we have already shown (Vol. I. p. 60), is a name of very uncertain application, and certainly not to be attributed to this species.

Gray, who likewise adopted the specific name “sing-sing” for this Antelope, appears first to have published a description of it under that name in the letterpress of the ‘Knowsley Menagerie’ in 1850, and in the ‘Proceedings’ of the Zoological Society for the same year. In the meanwhile, however, the name Antilope unctuosa had been bestowed upon it by Laurillard, in the first volume of the ‘Dictionnaire Universelle d’Histoire Naturelle,’ published in 1847, from a specimen living in the Menagerie of the Jardin des Plantes. There seems no doubt, therefore, that we ought to adopt Laurillard’s name for this Antelope, bestowed upon it because of its somewhat greasy fur.

Further confusion in its synonymy was caused from its being supposed by Gray and by many subsequent authors, nearly up to the present time, to be identical with the Defassa Antelope of Eastern Africa.

Gray, who probably derived his information from Whitfield, Lord Derby’s collector, tells us that this animal is called “Sing-sing” by the negroes of the Gambia, who do not think their flocks of cattle will be healthy or fruitful unless they have a tame Sing-sing in their company. The English on the Gambia are said to call it the “Jackass Deer,” and its flesh, we are told, is very strong, unpleasant, and scarcely palatable. Little, we regret to say, if anything, has been added to our knowledge of the habits of the Sing-sing in a state of nature and its range since the publication of Gray’s notes. None of the recent explorers of the western districts of Africa appear to have met with it, so that we may presume that its proper home is Senegal and the Gambia.

In captivity, however, singularly enough, the Sing-sing, as it is habitually called, is by no means scarce, and specimens of it may usually be found in the larger Zoological Gardens of the Continent. In several of these, for example at Antwerp and Berlin, and we believe in the Jardin des Plantes at Paris, the Sing-sing has bred and produced young. In our own Zoological Gardens, as has been already stated, the first specimen of the Sing-sing was received in 1831 or 1832, but, so far as we can ascertain from reference to the Society’s books, no other examples were obtained until 1867 and 1868, in which years two females of this species were added to the collection. In December 1885 an adult male was obtained, and in November 1886 an adult pair was received in exchange from the Jardin des Plantes, Paris.

Our illustration of the Sing-sing (Plate XXXIII.) has been prepared by Mr. Smit from the last-named pair, the female of which is still living in the Menagerie.

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXIV.

J. Smith del & lith.

Hanhart imp.

Crawshay’s Waterbuck

COBUS CRAWSHAYI

Published by R. H. Porter.

60. CRAWSHAY’S WATERBUCK.
COBUS CRAWSHAYI, Scl.
[PLATE XXXIV.]

Cobus crawshayi, Sclater, P. Z. S. 1893, p. 723.

Vernacular Name:—Chuzwi of the Awembas and the people of Itawa and Kabwiri (Crawshay).

Rather smaller in size than C. ellipsiprymnus, but generally resembling it, the animal being covered with the same harsh, lengthened, thinly spread hairs. But the colour is considerably darker, being of a dark iron-grey on the dorsal surface, which passes into blackish on the back of the neck, upper portion of the limbs, and tail. This colour gets gradually lighter and more greyish on the flanks, and passes on each side into whitish on the belly. There is no sign of the distinct rump-band which is so clearly marked on C. ellipsiprymnus, where it is bordered on each side by dark grey; but in the present species the whole anal disk is white, separated on the dorsal line by the dark medial streak which passes into the short black bushy tail. The whole length of the flat skin in the present example is about 56 inches, the length of the tail about 15 inches.

Horns hardly distinguishable from those of C. ellipsiprymnus. Those of type 24 inches in length along the curve, and strongly ringed to near their extremities, which are about 11·5 inches apart.

Hab. District of Lake Mweru in British Central Africa.

Mr. Alfred Sharpe, F.R.G.S., H.B.M. Vice-Consul in Southern Nyasaland, has twice made expeditions into the little-known district of Lake Mweru, which lies about 100 miles west of the south end of Lake Tanganyika. On his second journey in 1892, of which he has given an excellent account in the ‘Geographical Journal’ for 1893[5], Mr. Sharpe first encountered specimens of this Waterbuck, of which he sent to Sclater the following particulars:—“The first time I saw this Waterbuck I was close to Lake Mweru on my second journey there (Sept. 1892). I was only one day’s march from Crawshay’s Station[6] on the Lake, in a piece of rather dense bush, when my boys pointed out some beasts to me. From their bluish colour I thought at first they were buffaloes, but, on approaching nearer, I saw that they had the horns and general appearance of the Waterbuck (Cobus ellipsiprymnus) so common in Nyasaland. They were, however, not the Common Waterbuck, as, besides being much darker, they had no white ring on their buttocks. Before I could get a shot, however, they were away.

Fig. 31.

Skull and horns of Cobus crawshayi.

(P. Z. S. 1893, p. 727.)

“On reaching Crawshay’s house at Rhodesia on the following day, one of the first things he said to me was, ‘Now I am going to tell you about a new beast that I have found here.’ I replied at once, ‘I know what it is—a new Waterbuck.’ And so it was! Subsequently I obtained and sent you home an imperfect skin of this animal.”

Mr. Sharpe’s skin of this Antelope reached Sclater along with others forwarded by Mr. Crawshay, and furnished the materials for the description of the new species which was read by Sclater before the Zoological Society in November 1893. Sclater proposed to call the new Waterbuck after Mr. Crawshay, who was its first discoverer, and who, besides this, has written a series of excellent field-notes on the Antelopes of Nyasaland[7].

A letter subsequently received by Sclater from Mr. Crawshay contained the following remarks on his new discovery:—“Amongst the specimens sent to you the Waterbuck perhaps most interests me, as I fancy it must be of a new species. It most resembles Cobus ellipsiprymnus—the Common Waterbuck of Nyasa and Southern Africa—and may be termed the Waterbuck proper of Mweru. It is the ‘Chuzwi’ of the Awemba and the people of Itawa and Kabwiri, as opposed to the much more common and numerous red Vardon’s Waterbuck (Cobus vardoni), which is known by the same people as ‘Sayula.’

“In make and shape the Mweru buck is quite similar to C. ellipsiprymnus, and has the same shaggy coat and powerful ovine scent, but in size it is a trifle smaller, and in habits apparently it is rather different.

“In colouring and marking there exists a very appreciable difference, especially in the marking. The back and flanks of the Mweru species are of dark steel-blue, verging almost on black. The face, knees, hocks, fetlocks, and coronets of the feet are quite black—a glossy coal-black. Over the rump the broad crescent-shaped band of white found in C. ellipsiprymnus is absent, the bluish black on the rump gradually toning down into dirty grey at the root of the tail and between the haunches.

“Thus ‘Kringgat,’ the name by which the Dutch of Southern Africa know the Waterbuck, would not be characteristic of the Mweru animal.

“In the case of C. ellipsiprymnus running from one, the white band over the rump is so conspicuous a feature as to catch the eye in itself, and draw attention to the form of the animal disappearing between the trunks of trees, where otherwise in many instances it would escape notice. But with the Mweru Waterbuck running from one, the absence of the white band is at once apparent. I noticed the deficiency before even examining a specimen at close quarters.

“The ‘Chuzwi’ of Mweru is not very plentiful in either Itawa or Kabwiri; all told, during the year I was at Mweru, I doubt if I saw fifty, though of Vardon’s Waterbuck I saw many thousands. It is generally met with in hilly forest country—sometimes on steep rough ground—where Vardon’s Waterbuck does not go, and where one would scarcely expect to see C. ellipsiprymnus.

“I once came upon a troop of five females on the very topmost ridge of the mountains overlooking the Lualaba River—at the most northern point of Mweru Lake—where there were ‘Klipspringers,’ and where climbing with a rifle was anything but easy.

“In all I shot four specimens, two males and two females, all full-grown. Of these I preserved the complete skulls and hides of the males and the hide of one female.

“The larger of the two males was a solitary animal, shot in the forest, near Mputa’s, Kabwiri, east coast of Lake Mweru, September 10th, 1892. The horns measured on the straight 22¼ inches, on the curve 24⅝ inches.

“The other male, which was a smaller animal but had as good horns, and one of the females (the one preserved) were shot on the cliffs north of Karembwi’s, Kabwiri, east coast of Lake Mweru, July 27th, 1892.

“The horns of this male measured on the straight also 22¼ inches, on the curve 24½ inches.

“The second female I shot for meat on the left bank of the Choma River, about due north of Lake ‘Mweru ya Matipa’—the ‘Mweru of Mud,’ as the natives know the smaller Lake Mweru to the east of Lake Mweru proper—October 27th, 1892. The skins of these animals subsequently lost much of their dark colouring, a considerable quantity of the hair coming out (as it will do with the very movable coats of Waterbuck) and the remainder becoming lighter in drying.”

Our figure of this Waterbuck (Plate XXXIV.) has been taken by Mr. Smit from the typical male specimen now in the British Museum.

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXV.

J. Smit del. & lith.

Hanhart imp.

Penrice’s Waterbuck.

COBUS PENRICEI.

Published by R. H. Porter.

61. PENRICE’S WATERBUCK.
COBUS PENRICEI, Rothsch.
[PLATE XXXV.]

Cobus penricei, Rothsch. Nov. Zool. ii. p. 32, pl. iv. fig. 1 (1895); Bryden, Field, vol. lxxxvii. p. 653 (April 25, 1896).

Vernacular Name:—Kring-hart of the Trek-Boers of Benguela.

Of about the size of C. ellipsiprymnus and its allies (height at shoulders 45 inches), but at once distinguishable by its intensely blackish colour. Muzzle whitish; face black, with rufous hairs between the horns. Stripe over eye white. Ears outside rufous brown, with blackish tips and edges, inside white. Sides of face, neck, and body deep brownish black, plentifully interspersed with reddish-brown hairs, which are white at the base and give the effect of a “blue-roan.” This colour is more conspicuous on the belly, where the hairs are longer, but much less so on the legs and hind half of the back, which parts are almost uniform brownish black. A slight white ring round the hoofs. Tail above black, beneath white. A large patch of white on the upper throat.

Horns shorter and stouter than in the allied species; length along the curve in three specimens 19, 24½, and 28 inches.

Female similar, but without horns, and ears less rufous and more brown.

Hab. Interior of Benguela, Angola.

This Waterbuck is certainly very closely allied to Crawshay’s Waterbuck, and it is not easy to point out any material points of difference. The only specimens yet obtained being at Tring and those of C. crawshayi in the British Museum, we have not been able to make a direct comparison. But it would appear that the present animal is generally more blackish in colour and has shorter and stouter horns. Besides this, the respective localities of the two forms are so remote that it would not be safe to unite them without evidence that the same animal occurs in intermediate localities.

Mr. G. W. Penrice, the discoverer of this Antelope, and after whom it has been named by Mr. Rothschild, is resident, we are informed, at Cabo Submarino, near Benguela, the port and capital of the Province of the same name in the Portuguese Colony of Angola. During his hunting excursions in the interior Mr. Penrice came across specimens of it “near Bongo, on the banks of the Kuvali River, about one hundred miles south-east of Benguela and fifty miles from Caconda.” In a letter to Mr. Rowland Ward, Mr. Penrice says that it is “pretty numerous” in this locality, but “is not found nearer the coast.” He adds that these Antelopes “have a strong smell, and that he has often smelt them before sighting them. As a rule the bulls and cows are found in separate troops.”

An account of Penrice’s Waterbuck has been given by Mr. H. A. Bryden, in an article published in ‘The Field’ of April 25th last; but few additional particulars are furnished concerning it, although a list of other hunting-trophies obtained by Mr. Penrice in the same district is added. As regards Benguela, Mr. Bryden tells us that it is a most difficult country to hunt in, it being almost impossible to keep horses alive there, and the bush being very thick and nearly impenetrable, while the climate, especially near the coast, is not healthy. Nevertheless, we hope it may not be long before we get from some of our energetic sportsmen further information respecting this little-known species of Waterbuck.

Our Plate, which represents both sexes of it, has been prepared by Mr. Smit, by the kind permission of Mr. Rothschild, from the typical specimens in the Tring Museum.

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXVI.

Wolf del. J. Smit lith.

Hanhart imp.

The Defassa Waterbuck.

COBUS DEFASSA

Published by R. H. Porter.

62. THE DEFASSA WATERBUCK.
COBUS DEFASSA (Rüpp.).
[PLATE XXXVI.]

Antilope defassa, Rüpp. Neue Wirbelth. p. 9, pl. iii. (1835–40); Reichenb. Säugeth. iii. p. 133 (part.); Wagn. Schreb. Säugeth. iv. p. 423 (1844).

Redunca defassa, Rüpp. Verz. Senck. Mus., Säugeth. p. 182 (1842).

Cervicapra defassa, Sund. Pecora, K. Vet.-Ak. Handl. 1844, p. 195 (1846); id. Hornschuch’s Transl., Arch. Skand. Beitr. ii. p. 147 (1848).

Kobus defassa, Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. (1) xviii. p. 232 (1846); Hengl. Ant. u. Büff. p. 15 (1863); id. Reise, ii. p. 109 (1877); Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. pt. 1, p. 176 (1869); Matschie, Sitz. Ges. nat. Fr. 1892, p. 134.

Kobus defassus, Jackson, in Badm. Libr., Big Game Shooting, pp. 285, 304; Jent. Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. de P.-B. ix.) p. 130.

Cobus defassus, Flow. & Lyd. Mamm. p. 140; Lyd. Horns and Hoofs, p. 224 (1893) (partim).

Cobus defassa, Matschie, Säugeth. Ost-Afr. p. 124 (1895); Scl. P. Z. S. 1893, p. 727; id. P. Z. S. 1895, p. 868 (Lake Stephanie).

Kolus sing-sing, Gray, List Mamm. B. H. p. 159 (1843) (partim).

Kobus sing-sing, Gray, Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 99 (1852); id. Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 15 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 87 (1873); id. Knowsl. Men. p. 15 (1850) (partim).

Kobus sing-sing (?), Scl. P. Z. S. 1864, p. 101 (Uganda, Speke).

Ant. defassa, var. abyssinica, Wagn. Schreb. Säug. v. p. 435 (1855).

Vernacular Names:—Defassa (Amharic) of the Abyssinians; Om hetehet (Arabic), converted by Baker into Mehedéhet; Bura or Chora in Kordofan; Kuru and Nsumma in Uganda.

Size large, about 46 to 50 inches in height at the withers. Above rufous brown, hairs at base greyish white; belly and inner side of limbs white; rump white. Face above chestnut-red, sides of face and eye-stripe white. Ears long (about 8 inches), pointed, rufous at back, white inside; line round nose and chin white. Hairs on neck long and harsh. Feet below knees blackish brown, passing into black towards the hoofs; tail above like the back, otherwise whitish, about 12 inches long, tuft of hairs beyond 4 inches.

Female similar but without horns; teats four (Rüppell).

Hab. Western Abyssinia, Sennaar, Kordofan, and the Nile valley, south to Uganda and British and German East Africa.

Amongst the many zoological discoveries made by the great naturalist and traveller Dr. Edward Rüppell in Abyssinia and the surrounding lands about sixty years ago was the present species of Antelope, which he proposed to call “defassa” from its Amharic name. Rüppell published a figure and description of it in a work which he called ‘Neue Wirbelthiere zu der Fauna von Abyssinien gehörig,’ and dedicated to the Senate of his native State, the Free City of Frankfort-on-the-Main. After an excellent description of both sexes of Antilope defassa, Rüppell tells us that it lives in the grassy valleys of Western Abyssinia, round the Lake of Dembea, where it is generally met with in small families of from four to six individuals. Amongst these there is never more than one wholly adult male. What it prefers for food are the leaves and seed-stalks of Holcus sorghum besides grasses of every sort. Its gait is rather unwieldy, but it is not very timid. This Antelope, Dr. Rüppell continues, is also met with in Sennaar and Kordofan, where its common name is “Bura”; skins from these districts examined by him in Cairo were recognized as being similar to the Abyssinian “Defassa.” The Abyssinians do not often hunt this species, because so few of them care to eat meat, and its hide is of little value. It is, however, said to be the habitual food of the lions of the district that it inhabits. Rüppell’s specimens of both sexes are now in the Senckenbergian Museum at Frankfort, where Sclater has examined them.

Another great explorer of Eastern Africa, Th. v. Heuglin, met with this Antelope in the bushy and woody valleys of the Qualabat and Mareb, and thence eastwards to where the mountain-range falls off into the lowlands. He found it generally less difficult to approach than other Antelopes, and had many opportunities of shooting it at morning and evening amongst the high grasses that border the woods.

Fig. 32.

Head and foot of “Nsumma Antelope” (Speke).

(P. Z. S. 1864, p. 102.)

Sir Samuel Baker, in his ‘Albert Nyanza,’ alludes to this species as the “Mehedéhet” and gives a figure of the head in the second volume of his work. On arriving at the banks of the River Asua, which flows into the Nile north of the Victoria Nyanza, Baker tells us (op. cit. vol. ii. p. 15) that he “observed a herd of these beautiful Antelopes feeding upon the rich but low grass of a sand-bank in the very middle of the river.” He managed to secure one of them, which was found to weigh about 500 lbs., and was sufficient to supply a good dinner to the whole party.

To Cobus defassa, we now believe, must be referred the “Nsumma” of Uganda and Madi, a head of which was brought home from his celebrated journey by Speke, and was doubtfully referred by Sclater, in his account of Speke’s Mammals, to the Sing-sing. This head is still in the British Museum, and on comparison of it with a stuffed specimen of the present species shows few points of difference.

Speke notes that the “Nsumma” lies concealed “in the high grasses in the daytime, and only comes out to feed in the evening. The males are often found singly, but the females live in herds. It does not stand so high as the Waterbuck, but is rather more stoutly built.”

We believe that the “Sing-sing” of Jackson, in the volumes of the Badminton Library on Big Game Shooting, is also referable to the present species. Mr. Jackson speaks of it as follows:—“The Sing-sing (also known to the natives as ‘Kuru’) resembles the Waterbuck in habits, but is easily distinguished from it by its darker colour, and by a considerable amount of rufous hair on the top of the head, as well as by an entirely white rump in place of the elliptical white band of the other. The horns are also, as a rule, longer and more massive than those of the Waterbuck, the horns of the latter never growing to the size that they do in South Africa. It is not met with until near Lake Baringo, and extends west to Uganda where it was obtained by Captains Speke and Grant. It is fairly plentiful in the open bush-country of Turkevel; but it does not appear to go about in such large herds as the Waterbuck. I have never seen more than five or six together, and more often a bull and two or three cows.”

On the river running from the north into Lake Stephanie, Dr. Donaldson Smith met with a Waterbuck during his recent journey. Sclater has examined one of the heads that he brought home (see P. Z. S. 1895, p. 868) and has referred it without doubt to the present species.

In German East Africa, Herr Matschie recognizes Cobus defassa as well as C. ellipsiprymnus and gives several localities for it on the authority of Neumann and Böhm. The former met with it on the west shores of the Lake Victoria, and the latter near Lake Tanganyika and in Ugalla and Uganda. Böhm in his manuscript says that this Waterbuck reminds one much of a Stag in its appearance and mode of life. It is generally met with in largish herds in which there is only one old male and several younger ones. Sometimes these herds are without females in their company, and occasionally old males are seen alone. They are very fond of water and are often seen standing deep in the mud of the rivers. At the same time they are frequently met with in dry forest and in open savannahs far from rivers. Like our Red Deer, they generally retire into the wood early in the day, even before sunrise, but on the other hand come out again into the open much earlier in the evening. When disturbed in the open country they retire straight into the wood.

Herr Matschie points out that the present species differs from C. unctuosus in having the face of a bright rufous colour, and is of opinion that Dr. Noack and Dr. Pagenstecher have wrongly referred the specimens of this species obtained by several German explorers to C. unctuosus and C. ellipsiprymnus.

Our figure of this species (Plate XXXVI.) was put upon the stone by Smit from an original sketch by Wolf which is now in the possession of Sir Douglas Brooke. Unfortunately we have been unable to make out from what specimen it was originally prepared.

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXVII.

Wolf del. J. Smit lith.

Hanhart imp.

Mrs. Gray’s Waterbuck.

COBUS MARIA

Published by R. H. Porter.

63. MRS. GRAY’S WATERBUCK.
COBUS MARIA, Gray.
[PLATE XXXVII.]

Kobus maria, Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. (3) iv. p. 296 (1859) (Bahr-el-Gazal, Petherick); id. Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 16 (1872); id. Hand-1. Rum. B. M. p. 87 (1873); Gerrard, Cat. Bones Mamm. B. M. p. 239 (1862); Petherick, Travels in Centr. Afr. i. p. 159 (1869).

Cobus mariæ, Ward, Horn Meas. p. 91 (1892); Lyd. Horns and Hoofs, p. 224 (1893).

“Adenota megaceros, Heuglin,” Fitz. Sitz. Ak. Wien, xvii. p. 247 (1855), nomen nudum; Heuglin, Ant. u. Büff. N.O.-Afr. (N. Act. Leopold.-Carol.) xxx. pt. ii. p. 14, t. ii. figs. 7, 8 (1863) (descript. satis acc.); Marno, Reise in der Aegypt. Aequat.-Prov. p. 40 (1878).

Kobus megaceros, Marno, Reise im Geb. d. blauen u. weissen Nil, p. 387 (1874).

Vernacular Names:—“Abohk” of the Dinkas; “Til” of the Nuehrs.

Height at shoulders about 35–40 inches. General colour dark reddish brown. Forehead and nose dark brown, as are also the inner sides of the fore limbs and breast. Chin and a narrow band along the upper lip white, the latter continuing upwards behind the nostrils and there passing into brown. A spot in front of the eyes and the space between the eyes and ears whitish. This spot is separated from the superciliary stripe by a dark band descending from the base of the horn to the eye. Inside of ears whitish. A white band of hair on the hinder part of the head extends on both sides to the ears and forms a crescent-shaped mark; it then descends the back of the neck and widens into a large white patch above the shoulders. Middle of belly and inner sides of the hind limbs white. Tail long, above like the back, beneath white, tufted end black. A white line round the hoofs. Toes rather longer and stronger than in C. leucotis. Hairs of the cheeks and fore neck elongated and mane-like as in C. ellipsiprymnus, and muffle broad and naked as in that species. Size between that of C. leucotis and C. lechee.

Horns strongly ringed, long and strong, projecting backwards, diverging in the middle, and approximating again towards the tips. Length along the curve (type specimen) about 27 inches, in a straight line from back to point 19¼ inches, distance between tips 13¾ inches.

Female similar, but hornless, and not so deep in coloration.

The dark, almost chestnut-red general colour and conspicuous white patch on the upper back and nape render this Antelope quite unmistakable.

Hab. Swamps of the White Nile and adjoining rivers.

There can be no question that the great traveller and naturalist Theodor von Heuglin was the first discoverer of this splendid Antelope, which is one of the most strongly marked and most brightly coloured of the whole group. Unfortunately, however, Heuglin, though he gave it a name in 1855, did not take the trouble to publish a description of it until 1863, and meanwhile, as we shall presently see, it was described and named elsewhere.

The native country of Cobus maria, as this Antelope must be called, according to the law of priority now generally followed by naturalists, is the swamps and morasses traversed by the White Nile and the Sobat, Bahr-el-Gazal, and Lower Kir, which are its affluents on the right bank. Here Heuglin tells us it lives in large troops. After describing it he adds that, as in its allies, the hairs on the coat of the male are rather long and on the neck form a kind of mane. The white marking on the sides of the head varies much in form and extent, and is often tinged with reddish or yellowish. The same is the case with the ears. The long horns are twisted in a remarkable manner, so that from the side and below they look rather cork-screw like in shape. The tail, especially at the end, is more tufted and more strongly haired than in other Antelopes of this genus, and reaches down nearly to the heels.

On his return to Vienna about the year 1854, besides a series of skins and skulls, Heuglin brought with him an adult living female of this Antelope, which was placed in the Imperial Menagerie at Schönbrunn, but did not long survive. Its arrival was chronicled by Fitzinger in his Report to the Academy of Sciences of Vienna upon the living animals brought home for the Imperial Menagerie at Schönbrunn by Heuglin, and its proposed name was given as “Adenota megaceros, Heuglin,” but unfortunately no sort of description was added. Nor, so far as we can make out, did Heuglin publish any characters of his Adenota megaceros until the appearance of his article on the Antelopes and Buffaloes of North-east Africa, which was issued by the Imperial Leopoldino-Carolinian Academy in 1863.

Fig. 33.

Head of Cobus maria, ♂.

(Copied from Ann. Mag. N. H. (3) iv. p. 297.)

In the meanwhile, however, another explorer of the Nile region had found his way home and brought with him heads of both sexes of the same Antelope. This was Consul Petherick, who after fifteen years passed in these districts[8] returned in 1859, and brought with him a collection of heads and horns of animals, which were acquired by the British Museum through Mr. Samuel Stevens, a well-known dealer in objects of Natural History at that period. Amongst these were good heads of both sexes of the present Antelope. The late Dr. Gray lost but little time in preparing descriptions of these striking objects, which were published in the ‘Annals of Natural History’ for October of that year. We are indebted to the proprietors of that excellent journal for allowing us to copy the wood-block (fig. 33), which represents the head of the male brought home by Petherick. It thus came to pass that Dr. Gray’s name “maria” given in honour of his wife, “who assisted him in his studies,” takes precedence over Heuglin’s more appropriate designation “megaceros.”

Consul Petherick returned to the White Nile in 1861, on a mission to meet Speke and Grant on their journey northwards. In the first volume of his narrative of this second expedition[9] (p. 159) he records having killed a female of this same Antelope on June 15th, 1862, in the country of the Kitch negroes on the White Nile, and adds a figure of the head of the male, which was doubtless taken from the specimen sent home on the former expedition.

Several of the more recent travellers in the Nile districts appear to have also met with this Antelope. Marno (‘Reise im Gebiete des blauen und weissen Nil,’ 1874, p. 387) tells us that he saw a herd near Dabbed Hanakhi on the Bahr Seraf, in 1872, and that it is not uncommon there, and is called “Til” by the natives. In the course of his second journey (see ‘Reise in der Aegyptischen Aequatorial-Provinz’) Marno met with it again in the country of the Kitch negroes on the Bahr-el-Gebel, amongst the beds of papyrus and ambatch, and gives us a figure of its head, which, although not very well drawn, is unmistakable. Schweinfurth in his ’Im Herzen von Afrika,’ p. 68, also claims to have seen large herds of this Antelope on his voyage up the White Nile in about 12° 30´ N. lat., but did not bring home any specimens. Hartmann and von Barnem, as we are kindly informed by Herr Matschie, likewise met with this species on the White Nile and secured a pair of horns which are now in the Berlin Museum.

But the only perfect examples of this scarce Antelope yet obtained are those of Heuglin, of which two (an adult male and young one) are in the Vienna Museum, and a third (an adult male) at Berlin. Herr Matschie has most kindly supplied us with full notes on the last-named specimen, which has also been examined by Sclater.

In his ‘Horns and Hoofs,’ Mr. Lydekker casts some doubt as to the real distinctness of C. maria from C. leucotis, but on this point we can assure him there is no room for hesitation. No one who examines our beautiful picture of this species (Plate XXXVII.), drawn by Smit from Mr. Wolf’s original sketch, will for a moment deny its perfect distinctness from Cobus leucotis and from every other known species of the group.

August, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXVIII.

Wolf del., J. Smit lith.

Hanhart imp.

The White-eared Kob.

COBUS LEUCOTIS.

Published by R. H. Porter.

64. THE WHITE-EARED KOB.
COBUS LEUCOTIS (Licht. et Pet.).
[PLATE XXXVIII.]

Antilope leucotis, Licht. et Pet. MB. Ak. Berl. 1853, p. 164; iid. Abh. Ak. Berl. 1854, p. 96, pl. iii. (Sobat, Senuaar); Schweinf. Im Herzen v. Afr. i. pp. 213, 214, ii. p. 533 (1874) (Bahr-el-Djur); Huet, Bull. Soc. Acclim. 1887, p. 38; Emin, Reise-brief., pp. 99, 226 (1888); id. Transl. pp. 101, 130, 228; Junker, Travels in Afr. p. 441 (1891).

Kobus leucotis, Gerrard, Cat. Bones Mamm. B. M. p. 239 (1862); Gray, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 16 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 87 (1873).

Hydrotragus leucotis, Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. 1, p. 175 (1869).

Cervicapra leucotis, Baker, Ismailia, ii. p. 531 (1874) (Shooli country).

Cobus leucotis, Ward, Horn Meas. (1) p. 91 (1892), (2) p. 124 (1896); Lyd. Horns and Hoofs, p. 224 (1893).

Adenota lechee, Gray, Ann. Mag. N. H. (3) iv. p. 296 (1859) (Bahr-el-Gazal, Petherick) (nec ejusd. Knowsl. Men. 1850).

Adenota leucotis, Heugl. Ant. u. Büff. N.O.-Afr. (N. Act. Leop. xxx. pt. ii.) pp. 12, 13, pl. i. fig. 4 (head), 1863 (Sobat R.).

Adenota kul et A. wuil, Heuglin, op. cit. pp. 12, 13(?).

Vernacular Names:—Adjel of the Denkos; Kul and Wuil of the Djengs (Heuglin); Teel of the Shoolis (Baker); Kala of the Niam-Niams (Junker).

Size smaller and form slenderer than in any of the species hitherto described (height at withers about 34–35 inches). General colour dark brownish fawn; a large patch surrounding the eyes and ears, including the whole of the backs of the latter, another on the muzzle, chin, and upper throat, and the whole of the chest and belly pure white, strongly contrasting with the dark colour of the back. Front of legs blackish; a white ring round the pasterns, just above the hoofs.

Horns slender and graceful, attaining a length of 19 or 20 inches, though but little more than 6 inches in circumference.

Female similar, but without horns.

Skull measurements (♀):—Basal length 9·75 inches, greatest breadth 4·15, orbit to muzzle 6·45.

Hab. Upper Nile, region of the Sobat, Bahr-el-Gazal, and their affluents, extending into the Niam-Niam country.

The first example of this Antelope to reach Europe was transmitted to the Royal Zoological Museum of Berlin by Werne, a well-known German artist and traveller, from the River Sobat in Sennaar. It was characterized as belonging to a new species by Lichtenstein and Peters in a communication made to the Royal Academy of Sciences of Berlin in 1853, and in the following year was carefully described and figured by the same authors in the ‘Denkschriften’ of the Academy. The type specimen, an adult male, remains mounted in the gallery of the Berlin Museum (where Sclater has examined it), and is, we believe, that from which the original water-colour drawing of Wolf for the accompanying Plate was prepared.

The next traveller who appears to have met with the White-eared Kob was Consul Petherick, who brought home a skin, two heads, and several skulls of this species on his return from the Bahr-el-Ghazal in 1859. These specimens, which are in the British Museum, were at first incorrectly referred by Gray, in his article upon Petherick’s Mammals, to Cobus lechee, which, however, is quite a distinct species and never ranges nearly so far north.

Besides the Berlin and British Museums the only other collection that, so far as we know, contains a perfect example of this rare Antelope is the Royal Museum of Turin. Here, as Count Salvadori kindly informs us, there is a fully adult male example of Cobus leucotis mounted in the gallery, and standing about 35 inches high at the withers. This specimen was originally received alive from the Sudan, along with other animals, by King Victor Emmanuel, and on its death was presented to the Turin Museum.

Heuglin, in 1861, included this species in his list of the Antelopes and Buffaloes of North-east Africa, and gave a figure of its head, designating the Rivers Sobat and Bahr-el-Ghazal as its localities. It is probable that Heuglin’s “Adenota kul” and “A. wuil,” described as new in the same memoir, should also be referred to the present species; but as the descriptions are very meagre and, so far as we know, no specimens of these problematical species are extant, this must remain a matter of some uncertainty.

Since Heuglin’s time several other African explorers have met with this Antelope, but we are not aware that, with the exception of Sir Samuel Baker, they have brought home specimens. In the Appendix to ‘Ismailia,’ Sir Samuel placed the name of the present species in the list of animals met with in the Shooli country on the Upper Nile, and Sclater (who examined the specimens brought home by Baker) believes that there were some heads of this Antelope amongst them. Harnier’s description of an Antelope obtained in March 1861, during his voyage up the White Nile (Reise, p. 52, 1866), is apparently referable to Cobus leucotis. Dr. Schweinfurth, in ’Im Herzen von Afrika,’ mentions Antilope leucotis in several places, and in his first volume gives fairly accurate woodcuts of the heads of both sexes. On the lower flats of the rivers of the Niam-Niam country, Dr. Schweinfurth found this Antelope by far the commonest species in the dry season, being met with in large herds of from 100 to 300 individuals. During the rainy season, he tells us, it resorts to the higher forest-bushes and separates into small troops for pairing. He also mentions as a peculiarity of this elegant animal that when running away it springs up into the air after the manner of the South-African Spring-buck, and shows its white rump. The flesh of Antilope leucotis, he tells us, is one of the best for culinary purposes. The female he describes as being very like that of Cervicapra arundinacea, but recognizable at once by the black on the front limbs.

Emin, in his ‘Reise-briefen,’ refers in several passages to Antilope leucotis as met with on the Upper Nile. Dr. W. Junker, in his ‘Travels in Africa,’ records the capture of a “Kala Antelope, Antilope leucotis,” as far south as the Upper Welle (about 3° 30’ N. lat.), near Mount Madyanu, and gives a figure of it in his text. Looking to this and to what Dr. Schweinfurth has told us, we must assume that the present Antelope extends beyond the water-parting of the Nile and Congo down to the banks of the Welle.

December, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XXXIX.

J. Smit del. & lith.

Hanhart imp.

Thomas’ Kob.

COBUS THOMASI

Published by R. H. Porter.

65. THOMAS’S KOB.
COBUS THOMASI, Neumann.
[PLATE XXXIX.]

Kobus leucotis, Scl. P. Z. S. 1864, p. 103 (nec auctt.) (Uganda, Speke).

Kobus kob, Ward, Horn Meas. p. 91 (1892); Lugard, E. Africa, i. p. 538 (1893) (Buddu and Kavirondo); Jackson, Big Game Shooting, i. p. 296 (1894); Scott Elliot, P. Z. S. 1895, p. 341 (Albert-Edward Lake).

Adenota kob, Matschie, Säug. Deutsch Ost-Afr. p. 126 (1895).

Adenota koba, Matschie, op. cit. p. 147 (1895).

“Cobus thomasi, Neumann,” Sclater, P. Z. S. 1895, p. 868 (Kavirondo); Ward, Horn Meas. (2) p. 128 (1896).

Adenota thomasi, Neumann, P. Z. S. 1896, p. 192.

Cobus kob, Scott Elliot, P. Z. S. 1895, p. 341 (Lake Albert-Edward).

Vernacular Name:—Nsunnu or Nsunu of the Waganda (Speke, Lugard, &c.).

Size about as in C. leucotis, but form thicker and heavier (height at withers of an adult male 35½ inches). General colour rich fulvous. Area round eyes and another round bases of ears whitish; back of ears fulvous, with an indistinct tipping of black; hairs of inner surface of ears white. Muzzle, lips, chin, chest, belly, and inner sides of forearms and thighs white. Front of fore legs from middle of forearms downwards with a strongly defined black line, which broadens at the knees and pasterns; hind legs with a similar black mark, but only reaching up from the hoofs halfway towards the hocks. Remainder of limbs fulvous, an indistinct whitish ring just above the hoof; back of pasterns thickly hairy.

Horns thick and strongly curved, attaining a length of about 17 or 18 inches.

Female similar, but without horns.

Skull measurements (♂):—Basal length 10·4 inches, greatest breadth 4·6, orbit to muzzle 6·3.

Hab. Kavirondo and Uganda.

Thomas’s Kob, as it has been lately proposed to call the representative of this group of Antelopes in Kavirondo, Uganda, and the adjoining districts of Africa, after one of the authors of the present work, has been known for many years; but it has been unfortunately confounded with Cobus leucotis, C. vardoni, and C. kob, and has only been recently recognized as a distinct species. Although not unlike the White-eared Antelope, it is really much more nearly allied to the Kob of West Africa, of which it is in fact a larger form. From the Poku (Cobus vardoni) it is at once distinguishable by its black legs.

The first specimens of Thomas’s Kob that reached England were two heads brought home by Speke on his return from his celebrated East-African expedition in 1863. These were examined by Sclater, and in his report on the Mammals of the expedition (P. Z. S. 1864, p. 103) were erroneously referred to C. leucotis. But a re-examination of one of the specimens, which is now in the British Museum, has convinced us that it is undoubtedly referable to the present species. Speke remarks that this Antelope, of which the native name is “Nsunnu,” is “found in Uganda, Unyoro, and Madi, but never south of those countries. They roam about in large herds in the thick bush and grassy plains, but never go far from water.”

So far as we know, the next example that reached Europe of the present species was that of an adult male received by the British Museum from Mr. F. J. Jackson in 1891, from which our figure (Plate XXXIX.) has been taken. This specimen was mounted and placed in the Mammal gallery, and named at first C. vardoni, and afterwards C. kob. Other examples of the same Antelope were subsequently received at South Kensington from Mr. Gedge, Capt. Lugard, and Mr. Scott Elliot, and referred to the Kob. Mr. Gedge’s specimens were obtained in Uganda, Capt. Lugard’s on the south-west coast of the Albert Nyanza, and Mr. Scott Elliot’s near the Albert-Edward Lake.

In the autumn of 1895, Herr Oscar Neumann, the distinguished German traveller and naturalist, came to the British Museum for the purpose of examining the Mammals in the collection, and of comparing them with the specimens he had himself obtained during his journeys through German and British East Africa in 1892–5. Herr Neumann, who visited the Musée d’Histoire Naturelle at Paris for the same purpose, found during his researches at these places that the so-called “Kob” of East Africa was essentially different from the true Kob of Western Africa. Thomas in this country, and M. Poussarges in France, had also come to the same conclusion: Thomas from an examination of specimens of the true Cobus kob recently obtained by Capt. Lugard on the Niger, and M. Poussarges from a comparison of a specimen of the present Antelope procured by M. Decle in Uganda with the original types of Buffon’s “Kob.” Herr Neumann therefore proposed to call the new Eastern species after Mr. Thomas, and designated as its type Mr. Scott Elliot’s specimen from Uganda, to which he affixed the specific name thomasi in MS. But the preparation of Herr Neumann’s description was unfortunately delayed, and was not transmitted to the Zoological Society of London for publication until January 1896. In the meanwhile, Sclater, supposing from the delay that the description in question might have been sent to some periodical in Germany, had exhibited a mounted head of the same Antelope (obtained by Mr. E. Gedge on the eastern shores of Lake Victoria, as hereafter mentioned) and had given its name as “Cobus thomasi, Neumann, MS.” This, therefore, was actually the first publication of the species under its present name, and it may possibly be a moot point for experts in questions of priority whether Mr. Gedge’s specimen ought not really to be considered the “type.” It is satisfactory, however, that both the possible “types” are in the British Museum, so that no international complications can arise from such a controversy.

The “Kob” of Uganda, as Mr. F. J. Jackson in his excellent chapter on Antelopes in “Big Game Shooting” calls this species, following the then prevalent opinion as to its identity, “is first met with in British East Africa near Mumia’s, in Upper Kavirondo. Here I saw a small herd on three consecutive days on the banks of the Nzoia, quite near to the same place. As I was after Hippos at the time, and never got near the Antelopes, I mistook them for Impalas, and paid no further attention to them, until one day Mr. Gedge brought in the head of one he had shot, and I at once recognized my mistake. On going out specially to get one or two I found them plentiful. This beast is rarely seen more than 300 or 400 yards from water. It is very shy, and unless found in long grass (about the only covert there is, excepting ant-heaps, in the places it haunts) is very difficult to stalk. It is extraordinarily tough, and requires a great deal of killing. When wounded it takes to the reeds along the river-banks and in the swampy hollows, but when only alarmed prefers to keep to the open for safety. This Antelope is evidently plentiful near the shores of Victoria Nyanza, as nearly all the Waganda canoes are ornamented on their high projecting prow with its frontlet and its horns. These beasts are usually found in small herds, consisting of a buck and three or four does. I have also seen one herd of some twenty-five, consisting entirely of bucks.”

Mr. Ernest Gedge has kindly favoured us with the following notes on this Antelope:—“My experience of these animals has been but small, owing to their extremely local distribution. I first encountered them in Upper Kavirondo, to the west of Mumia’s, in the vicinity of the Nzoia River, in the month of November. On another occasion I saw them near the Nile, when on an elephant-hunting expedition in Uganda, and again in the province of Buddu to the N.W. of the Victoria Nyanza.

“As far as my experience goes it would seem that these are water-loving animals, and not to be found except in the vicinity of swamps and rivers.

“The times at which specimens may best be secured are the early morning and towards sundown, when the animals leave the shelter of the high reeds and thickets (in which they appear to lie up during the heat of the day) and come to their feeding-grounds. Four or five is the greatest number I have ever seen at one time, more generally they are met with singly or in pairs.

“They are not very difficult to stalk, as they are generally near covert, or on broken ground of some kind, favourable to the hunter, and, moreover, they have not the shy, suspicious nature of the Hartebeest, unless some of the latter happen to be in their vicinity, in which case they become more difficult to approach.

“Their tenacity of life is very great, and unless disabled at once the chances are against the hunter, the impenetrable nature of the swamps and jungles to which they fly when wounded precluding all hope of pursuit.

“Their colour is a rich rufous, turning to white on the belly and inside the thighs, the females being somewhat lighter in colour than the males. Their whole appearance is handsome and well proportioned, whilst the head makes an exceptionally graceful trophy. I would mention that the last specimen I procured was a single buck, which I shot in the vicinity of Berkeley Bay on my return from Uganda in 1893. It was lying at the edge of a papyrus-swamp, and as it sprang off at my approach a lucky snap-shot secured for me the finest head I possess of this Antelope.”

Fig. 34.

Head of Cobus thomasi, [♂].

(P. Z. S. 1895, p. 869.)

This specimen, of which, by the kindness of the Zoological Society, we are enabled to reproduce the original figure from the ‘Proceedings,’ has recently been presented by Mr. Gedge to the British Museum.

Herr Neumann gives the localities of this Antelope as “Kavirondo, Ussoga, Uganda, Unyoro, Albert Lake, and, finally, Simiu River, at the south-east corner of Lake Victoria,” where it was obtained by Herr Langheld.

December, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XL.

Wolf del. J. Smit lith.

Hanhart imp.

Buffon’s Kob.

COBUS KOB.

Published by R.H.Porter.

66. BUFFON’S KOB.
COBUS KOB (Erxl.).
[PLATE XL.]

Le Kob, Buff. Hist. Nat. xii. pp. 210 & 267, pl. xxxii. fig. 1 (1764) (Senegal); Ogilby, P. Z. S. 1836, p. 102.

Antilope kob, Erxl. Syst. R. A. p. 293 (1777); Zimm. Geogr. Gesch. ii. p. 124 (1780); Gatt. Brev. Zool. i. p. 84 (1780); G. Cuv. Dict. Sci. Nat. ii. p. 234 (1804); Desm. N. Dict. d’H. N. (2) ii. p. 187 (1816); Goldf. Schr. Säug. v. p. 1240 (1818); Desm. Mamm. ii. p. 457 (1822); Less. Man. Mamm. p. 375 (1827); J. B. Fisch. Syn. Mamm. p. 463 (1829); Laurill. Dict. Univ. d’H. N. i. p. 617 (1839); Wagn. Schr. Säug. Suppl. iv. p. 435 (1844), v. p. 432 (1855); Fraser, Zool. Typ. pl. xx. (1849); Temm. Esq. Zool. Guin. pp. 190 & 199 (1853).

Cerophorus (Gazella) kob, Blainv. Bull. Soc. Philom. 1816, p. 75.

Adenota kob, Gray, Knowsl. Men. p. 14, pls. xiv. & xv. (1850); id. P. Z. S. 1850, p. 129; id. Ann. & Mag. N. H. (2) viii. p. 211 (1851); id. Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 96 (1852); Gerrard, Cat. Bones Mamm. B. M. p. 238 (1862); Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. 1, p. 174 (1869); Gray, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 17 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 87 (1873); Jent. Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, ix.) p. 130 (1887); id. Cat. Mamm. Leyd. Mus. (op. cit. xi.) p. 159 (1892); Matschie, MT. deutsch. Schutz-geb. vi. p 17 (1893) (Togoland).

Cobus kob, Lyd. Field, lxxvii. p. 980 (1891); id. Horns and Hoofs, p. 224 (1893); Scl. P. Z. S. 1895, p. 688; Ward, Horn Meas. (2) p. 127 (1896).

Antilope forfex, H. Sm. Griff. An. K. iv. p. 221, v. p. 334 (1827) (from Pennant’s “Gambian Antelope”); Less. Compl. Buff. x. p. 289 (1836); Reichenb. Säug. iii. p. 110 (1845).

Antilope adenota, H. Sm. Griff. An. K. iv. p. 223, v. p. 335 (1827); A. Sm. S. Afr. Quart. J. ii. p. 209 (1834); Reichenb. Säug. iii. p. 110 (1845).

Kobus adansoni, A. Sm. Ill. Zool. S. Afr. text to pl. xxix. (1840).

Antilope annulipes, Gray, Ann. & Mag. N. H. x. p. 267 (1842).

Adenota buffoni, Fitz. SB. Ak. Wien, lix. 1, p. 174 (1869)[10].

Vernacular Names:—Æquitoon of the Joliffs, and Kob of the Mandingos, at the Gambia (Whitfield, fide Gray).

Similar in general character and markings to C. thomasi, but size much smaller, form slenderer, and markings less strongly defined. The black leg-markings are present, though not so deeply black as in the last species, and are succeeded below by a white ring round the pasterns, separating them from the hoofs. Back of pasterns hairy.

Horns much smaller than in any of the allied forms, only attaining a length of about 14–15 inches.

Female. Similar, but without horns.

Skull measurements (♂):—Basal length 9·5 inches, greatest breadth 4·45, orbit to muzzle 5·9.

Hab. W. Africa, from the Gambia to the Niger.

In the twelfth volume of his celebrated ‘Histoire Naturelle,’ the great French naturalist Buffon distinguished two Antelopes from Senegal as the “Koba” and the “Kob.” Of the difficulties experienced by subsequent authors in deciding what Buffon’s “Koba” really was, we have already spoken in our article on Damaliscus korrigum (Vol. I. p. 60). But as regards the “Kob” there can, we think, be no question that Buffon’s “Kob, ou petit vache brune de Sénégal” is clearly the same as that which we now call Cobus kob, and propose to designate in English “Buffon’s Kob,” to distinguish it from its fellows of the same group.

Erxleben, in 1777, seems to have been the first writer to Latinize Buffon’s vernacular name as “Antilope kob.” In this he was followed by most of the early systematists, who, however, added nothing to our knowledge of the animal. Little more, in fact, was known of this Antelope until about 1827, when a fresh description of it was published by Hamilton Smith in Griffith’s edition of Cuvier’s ‘Animal Kingdom,’ taken from a pair of animals then living in the Menagerie at Exeter Change. Colonel Hamilton Smith, being uncertain whether this was the true “Kob” of Buffon, gave it a new name, adenota, derived from the small gland situated on its back ἀδἡν, glandula, and νῶτος, dorsum). There can be no doubt, however, that Hamilton Smith’s description of his Antilope adenota, which is accompanied by a very fair figure of the male, refers to Buffon’s Kob. Another name bestowed upon this Antelope by Hamilton Smith, in the same work, was Antilope forfex, based on Pennant’s “Gambian Antelope.”

The first specimen of the Kob Antelope that reached Europe alive, so far as we know, was that presented to the Zoological Society of London by Mr. John Foster in 1836, which was subsequently figured in Fraser’s ‘Zoologia Typica’ (plate xx.). Fraser tells us that it lived about three years in the Society’s Gardens. This is no doubt the specimen that is referred to by Ogilby as the “Kob of Buffon” in his remarks printed in the ‘Proceedings of the Zoological Society’ for 1836 (page 102). Although Ogilby’s references to it are not very comprehensible, this fact is clearly established by what Fraser says in his ‘Zoologia Typica.’

Shortly after this period living specimens of this Antelope were obtained at the Gambia and brought home for the Knowsley Menagerie by Whitfield, Lord Derby’s collector. Upon these animals Gray established his Antilope annulipes in 1842, but in the letterpress to the ‘Gleanings’ Gray admitted that they were really referable to the present species. Gray states that a fine pair “had been at Knowsley for some years,” and adds that they are called on the Gambia “Æquitoon” by the Joliffs and “Kob” by the Mandingos. On plates xiv. and xv. of the ‘Gleanings’ good coloured figures of the male, female, and young of this species will be found, taken from drawings made from life by Waterhouse Hawkins. From this it would appear that the Kob, like many other Antelopes, bred in those days at Knowsley.

We cannot ascertain that any living examples of the Kob have been received by the Zoological Society subsequently to that obtained in 1836 as already mentioned; but a female, which was formerly living in the Zoological Garden of Amsterdam, is now in the gallery of the Leyden Museum, and in August 1895 Sclater saw a fine male of this species in the Jardin des Plantes at Paris (see P. Z. S. 1895, p. 688) and another male in the private collection of the late Mr. Sharland at Tours. These two animals, we have been informed, were imported together from West Africa.

From Senegal and the Gambia the Kob extends through the interior of West Africa to Togoland, where it has been obtained by the German collectors inland from Bismarckburg and far into the Niger territory. As regards the latter locality, Sclater has examined a pair of horns of the Kob obtained by Capt. A. F. Mockler-Ferryman at Ibi, on the Benué, in the autumn of 1889, when he was travelling with Major Claude Macdonald’s expedition up that river; and Capt. Mockler-Ferryman has kindly supplied us with the following note on them:—“The Antelopes, from a male of which this pair of horns were taken, were fairly plentiful everywhere in the open park-like country of the Benué, and, so far as I can remember, were exactly similar in habits to Vardon’s Antelope, as described by Selous. These horns measure 17½ inches in length along the curve. The females of this Antelope had no horns.”

In 1895 Capt. Lugard during his expedition to Bornu obtained a skin and two skulls of this Antelope at Lukoja on the Niger, and presented them to the British Museum. It was the examination of Capt. Lugard’s specimens that first convinced Thomas that the Uganda Kob (subsequently named Cobus thomasi) belongs to a different species. The specimens previously in the National Collection (a male and female from the Gambia, collected by Whitfield) were both immature, and consequently of little use for accurate comparison.

Our figure of Buffon’s Kob (Plate XL.) was lithographed for Sir Victor Brooke by Smit from a coloured drawing by Wolf, but we have not been able to ascertain from what specimen the drawing was originally taken.

December, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XLI.

J. Smit del. & lith.

Hanhart imp.

The Poku.

COBUS VARDONI.

Published by R. H. Porter.

67. THE POKU.
COBUS VARDONI (Livingst.).
[PLATE XLI.]

Antilope vardoni, Livingstone, Miss. Trav. p. 256 (Barotse valley), and pl. p. 71 (1857).

Heleotragus vardonii, Kirk, P. Z. S. 1864, p. 657 (Zambesia).

Cobus vardoni, Selous, P. Z. S. 1881, p. 759, pl. lxv.; id. Hunter’s Wand. pp. 111, 147, 219, pl. v. (1881) (Chobe); Ward, Horn Meas. (1) p. 92 (1892), (2) p. 129 (1896); Sclater, P. Z. S. 1892, p. 98; id. P. Z. S. 1893, p. 728 (Lake Mweru).

Eleotragus vardoni, Huet, Bull. Soc. Acclim. 1887, p. 48; Matschie, SB. Ges. nat. Fr. Berl. 1891, p. 138.

Kobus vardoni, Nicolls & Egl. Sportsm. S. Afr. p. 43, pl. viii. fig. 30 (1892).

Adenota vardoni, Matschie, Säug. Deutsch. Ost-Afr. p. 126 (1895).

Vernacular Names:—Pookoo, Poku, or Puku throughout its range; Impookoo of the Masubias (Selous); Sawwula of Kinyamwesi (Böhm, fide Matschie).

Size and general characters almost exactly as in C. thomasi, but the legs entirely without any trace of the black markings so conspicuous in C. kob and C. lechee. Height at withers of an adult male 35½ inches, female the same. Back of ears fulvous, their extreme tips edged with black. Pasterns hairy, scarcely any trace of a white ring above hoofs.

Horns thick and strongly curved, having a length of about 17 or 18 inches.

Female. Similar, but hornless.

Skull measurements (♂):—Basal length 11 inches, greatest breadth 4·47, muzzle to orbit 7·25.

Hab. Valleys of Chobe and Zambesi, and northwards through the Barotse country to Lake Mweru.

Our first knowledge of this species is due to the great explorer Livingstone. When in the Barotse country beyond Libonta, in November 1853, he found “the wild animals in enormous herds, and fared sumptuously. It was grievous, however,” he adds, “to shoot the lovely creatures, they were so tame.” While waiting for an answer to a message sent to a native chief he “lay looking at the graceful forms of the beautiful pokus, lechès, and other antelopes.” In a footnote to this passage in his ‘Missionary Travels’ he informs us that the Poku “is a new species which he proposes to name after the African traveller Major Vardon.” We do not believe that Livingstone ever published a description of his species, but in the same work (p. 71) will be found a full-page plate, from the inimitable pencil of Joseph Wolf, illustrating the “New African Antelopes (Poku and Lechè) discovered by Oswell, Murray, and Livingstone.”

In 1864 we have a further contribution to our knowledge of this animal from the pen of Sir John Kirk. In his article on the Mammals of Zambesia read before the Zoological Society of London on December 13th of that year, he tells us that the Poku “is one of the three water-antelopes common to the marshes of the Chobi and Zambesi. With the Lechè it often mixes, the habits of the two being very similar, the Poku being less aquatic and being found more often on dry ground. It is known by its smaller size, its more erect carriage, and its plumper neck. The horns are less turned backwards, and partake more of the aspect of the Reit-bock.”

Mr. Selous’s excellent field-notes on the Poku, contained in the ‘Proceedings’ of the same Society for 1881, and subsequently reprinted in his ‘Hunter’s Wanderings,’ deserve to be quoted at full length:—

“The only place where I ever met with this species was in a small tract of country extending along the southern bank of the Chobe for about seventy miles westward from its junction with the Zambesi. They are never found at more than 200 or 300 yards from the river, and are usually to be seen cropping the short grass along the water’s edge, or lying in the shade of the trees and bushes scattered over the alluvial flats which have been formed here and there by the shifting of the river’s bed. That they exist, however, eastwards along the southern bank of the Zambesi as far as the Victoria Falls (about sixty miles from the mouth of the Chobe) I think probable, as I saw one shot on the very brink; but though I followed the river’s bank all the way, I never met with another till I reached the Chobe. The natives report them common on the eastern bank of the Zambesi, north of Lesheke. From a plate in Dr. Livingstone’s first book I always imagined that the Pookoo was found at the Lake Ngami; but, as he makes no mention of it in the letterpress before reaching the Zambesi, and as neither Andersson nor Baldwin, who both visited the lake, seem to have known of its existence at all, this is perhaps erroneous. In size they stand about the same height at the shoulder as the Impala, but, being much thicker-set and stouter built, must weigh considerably more. The colour is a uniform foxy red, the hair along the back about the loins being often long and curly; the tips of the ears are black. The males alone bear horns, which are ringed to within three inches of the point, and curve forwards like those of the Lechwe, to which animal they are very closely allied. The longest pair I have in my possession measures sixteen inches, which is about the extreme length they ever attain. These Antelopes are usually met with in herds of from three or four to a dozen in number; but on one of the alluvial flats to which I have before referred I have seen as many as fifty in one herd. Sometimes ten or a dozen rams may be seen together, or a solitary old fellow quite alone. I have often seen these Antelopes feeding in company with a herd of Impalas, and then their heavy thick-set forms contrasted strongly with the slim and graceful proportions of the latter animals. The meat of the Waterbuck is usually considered to be more unpalatable than that of any other South-African Antelope; but, if it will give anyone satisfaction to know it, I can conscientiously say that that of the Pookoo is several shades worse. In conclusion, I have found that they and their congener the Lechwe are wonderfully tenacious of life, and will run long distances after receiving wounds that one would think ought to be immediately fatal.”

Fig. 35.

Horns of Cobus vardoni.—a. Side view; b. Front view.

(P. Z. S. 1881, p. 760.)

Mr. Selous’s field-notes on this Antelope are accompanied by an excellent coloured figure of the whole animal, and by some drawings of the horns, which, by the kind permission of the Zoological Society, we are enabled to reproduce here (see fig. 35, p. 143).

It was until recently supposed that the Poku did not extend its range far north of the Zambesi; but in 1890 Mr. Alfred Sharpe met with it on the Luapula north of Lake Mweru, and says (Pr. R. G. S. n. s. xiv. p. 39) that it is common there, although unknown in the countries bordering on Lake Nyasa. Mr. Sharpe sent home three flat skins and several pairs of horns of this species, which were examined by Sclater (P. Z. S. 1892, p. 98; 1893, p. 728), and says, in his accompanying notes, “I doubt if game can be anywhere more plentiful in Central Africa than in the Mweru and Luapula countries. Cobus vardoni and C. lechee run in enormous herds. These two Antelopes are frequently found together, are much alike in appearance, and are both known by the natives as ‘Nswala.’ (The Impala is also called ‘Nswala’ by them.) The horns of the Letchwé have a much larger spread than those of Vardon’s Antelope, but at a distance it is difficult to distinguish between the two. The Letchwé has a little black stripe on the fore legs which is not found in Vardon’s Antelope. A noticeable feature about the male Letchwé is that when he runs he puts his head down, laying back the horns. Vardon’s Antelope does not do this.” Mr. Sharpe also met with C. vardoni occasionally near the south end of Lake Tanganyika. In the narrative of his second journey to Lake Mweru in 1892 (Geogr. Journ. i. p. 526) Mr. Sharpe has again noticed the abundance of the Poku in the Mweru swamp along with the Lechee.

Our figures of Cobus vardoni (Plate XLI.) were drawn by Mr. Smit from the mounted specimens of both sexes in the British Museum procured by Mr. F. C. Selous at Umparira, on the River Chobe, in 1881. There are skins and skulls in the same collection obtained by Mr. Sharpe and Mr. Crawshay in the district of Lake Mweru.

December, 1896.

68. THE SENGA KOB.
COBUS SENGANUS, SP. N.

Similar to C. vardoni in most respects, but very much smaller (height at withers in a female, measured in the flesh, 30½ inches). General colour rather darker than in C. vardoni, especially on the head. Ears black, tipped behind for fully one-third of the length, instead of merely at their extreme tip. No white ring above the hoofs.

Horns unknown.

Skull measurements of the type (♀), not fully adult, although enceinte when killed:—Basal length 8·9 inches, greatest breadth 3·75, orbit to muzzle 5·85.

Hab. Senga, Upper Loangwa River, W. of the N. end of Lake Nyasa: altitude 2500 feet.

This Antelope, the second member of the genus lately discovered and recognized by Mr. Richard Crawshay, seems to be a small highland form of the Poku, and it is possible that intermediate specimens between the two may be hereafter found. In this case C. senganus will have to be reduced to a subspecies of C. vardoni. But until such intermediate forms are obtained we do not feel justified in presuming their existence, and therefore class C. senganus as a different species.

The only specimen of C. senganus as yet procured is unfortunately a female, young enough still to retain its milk-dentition. The general development of the skull, however, and the fact that, as we are informed by Mr. Crawshay, there was a nearly mature fœtus within the womb, show that the animal had practically attained its full growth, and therefore that its small size may be justifiably used as a distinguishing character.

We subjoin the notes with which Mr. Crawshay has favoured us on this species:—

“The form of Cobus represented by the present specimen from Senga, to the west of Lake Nyasa, is only met with, I believe, in the neighbourhood of the Upper Zambesi River, in the water-basins of Lakes Mweru and Tanganyika, and perhaps also in those of one or two more of the Central African lakes. It does not occur in the water-basin of Lake Nyasa itself, where only the large grey C. ellipsiprymnus is found; nor until now has it ever been recorded nearer Lake Nyasa than the valley of the Sayisi River, 30 miles or so east of the southern end of Lake Tanganyika, where C. vardoni is met with. It remains to be seen what naturalists make of it: whether it is to be regarded as only a diminutive race of C. vardoni or as a new species altogether.

“In general shape and colouring, seen by itself, it appears to be C. vardoni; in size, however, it is considerably smaller; and when specimens of the two come to be laid side by side there may be other points of difference. But I wish to lay stress on the fact that, apart from the distance separating the districts where the two are found, the physical aspects of their several haunts differ very materially.

“Cobus vardoni is always found in or on the outskirts of swamps, usually on open, marshy plains, where the grass is rich and green; moreover, as a rule, it is met with in large scattered herds, feeding in the open all over the place—such at any rate has been my experience in the countries bordering on Lakes Tanganyika and Mweru. On the other hand, C. senganus is a native of dry, hilly country, often rough and stony, and far from any swampy land, though near a river. Again, it is not at all plentiful in Senga; I saw only two during my travels in the neighbourhood, both females, of which the present specimen is one.

“Regarding the habits of this animal I know very little—no more, in fact, than when, where, and how I became possessed of the specimen, which was as follows:—

“During the latter part of the dry season of 1895 I had occasion to undertake a journey from Deep Bay on Lake Nyasa into the Senga country, which is in the valley of the Loangwa River—a very considerable stream even at this point. The Loangwa drains a large area of country between Lakes Nyasa and Bangweolo, and after a course of some 400 miles or more, about south by west, joins the Zambesi as one of its chief tributaries. From Konde to where I struck the Loangwa—which flows through Senga—is a tortuous journey of about 8 days for loaded porters; much of the intervening country is hilly and broken; during part of the distance water is a difficulty in the dry season.

“Senga is intensely African: in point of interest for the traveller and sportsman naturalist it impressed me more than any other part of Africa I have seen. It is of vast extent, yet thinly populated; it is hilly and rugged and cut up with innumerable perpendicular ravines. Its soil, except in the neighbourhood of the river, is mostly hard, yellowish-white sand; it is intensely hot, and but for the Loangwa River would be a desert for want of water; the whole country, then, is buried in never-ending forest or scrubby bush—hence its local name ‘Masenga.’

“It was on September 12th, in about latitude 10° 15´ south, that I secured the Cobus; the altitude of the Loangwa River at this point is 2410 feet, according to my aneroid. I was on the march between Kampumbu’s town and another town, Myereka’s, about 18 miles higher up the Loangwa: my caravan had preceded me by an hour or two; I had remained behind with a couple of gun-bearers and three Wasenga guides, and was making a detour in search of game.

“The day previous I had shot a Roan Antelope, but on this particular day I had not shot anything, and indeed had only seen a few Impala, which did not give one a chance.

“It was a terrifically hot day; the Loangwa valley is like a furnace at this time of year, just before the rains. Every bit of cover had been burned off and there was not a leaf or a blade of grass anywhere. The ground was baked as hard as a brick and had cracked into deep fissures; the heat and glare almost sickened me, old traveller as I am and inured to heat. Nevertheless, in spite of all this, we came upon the two Antelopes of the genus Cobus standing in the open, close to the foot of a very rough conical hill, about 1 o’clock in the afternoon. I shot one without remarking anything unusual about them, viewed at about 120 yards; had I wished it, I could have shot the other, but I refrained as both were females. The Wasenga who were with me could not at once identify the animal; an hour or two later, however, the older men of Myereka’s town pronounced it to be ‘Sewula’ and ‘Seyula.’

“The latter name is that by which the Wawemba call C. vardoni—not ‘Inswala’ as Mr. Sharpe has stated in the account he wrote of his journey to Mweru; he was no doubt misled by his Watonga porters from Lake Nyasa, who gave him what is the Manganga name for the ‘Impala,’ which they confused with C. vardoni, never having seen that animal before.

“It is curious how very accurate Livingstone’s information proves to be, even on such small points as these; he, though not a sportsman or one who cared much for natural history, records in his last journals the Wawemba name for C. vardoni as ‘Sebula’—which of course might be a mistake in the printing for ‘Seyula,’ the name by which the Wawemba call this animal to the present day.

“It will bear me out in my statement that this Cobus is considerably smaller than C. vardoni, when I say that two of the Wasenga carried the animal, turn and turn about, for some three miles, when they were relieved by other men sent out from camp.

“I should estimate its weight at, roughly, 90 lbs., possibly more. It is an adult specimen; for we found in her a fœtus (♂), to which she would have given birth in another week or 10 days.

“Her height at the withers, as she lay dead, measured 30½ inches.”

Mr. Crawshay’s typical specimen (now by his kindness deposited in the British Museum) being the only example yet obtained of this species, we have nothing more to say about it, except to express our regret that it arrived too late to be figured, or to be included in the synopsis of the species of Cobus given above (p. 95).

December, 1896.

THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES, PL. XLII.

Wolf del., J. Smit lith.

Hanhart imp.

The Lechee.

COBUS LECHEE.

Published by R. H. Porter.

69. THE LECHEE.
COBUS LECHEE (Gray).
[PLATE XLII.]

Leechee, Oswell, J. R. G. S. xx. p. 150 (1851); Livingstone, J. R. G. S. xxi. p. 23 (1851); id. Miss. Trav. p. 71 & plate (1857); Andersson, Lake Ngami, p. 448, pl. xiii. (1856).

Kobus leché, Gray, Knowsl. Men. p. 23 (1850); Turner, P. Z. S. 1850, p. 174.

Adenota leché, Gray, P. Z. S. 1850, p. 130, Mamm. pl. xx.; id. Ann. Mag. N. H. (2) viii. p. 212 (1851); Huet, Bull. Soc. Acclim. 1887, p. 77.

Adenota lechee, Gray, Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 97 (1852); Gerrard, Cat. Bones B. M. p. 239 (1862).

Heleotragus leché, Kirk, P. Z. S. 1864, p. 658 (Upper Zambesi).

Onotragus lechee, Gray, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 17 (1872); id. Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 88 (1873).

Cobus leechi, Buckley, P. Z. S. 1876, p. 291.

Cobus lechee, Selous, P. Z. S. 1881, p. 760; id. Hunter’s Wand. S. Afr. p. 220 (1881); Ward, Horn Meas. (1) p. 90 (1892), (2) p. 125 (1896); Sclater, P. Z. S. 1893, p. 728 (L. Mweru, Sharpe).

Kobus lechee, Nicolls et Egl. Sportsm. in S. Afr. p. 42, pl. vii. fig. 22 (1892).

Vernacular Names:—Leche or Leegwee of the Makalolos. Inya of the Masubias; Oonya of the Makubias (Selous).

Size nearly equal to that of the large Waterbucks of the first section of the genus (height at withers 40–41 inches), although the general form is more graceful. Colour fulvous, slightly paler than in C. thomasi, which this species resembles in having well-defined black markings running down the legs, but which are succeeded below by white rings above the hoofs. Backs of both fore and hind pasterns quite naked, a character which distinguishes this species from all its allies. Pale areas round eyes and ears not sharply defined; back of ears not black-tipped. Muzzle, lips, chin, and belly white as usual. Tail slender, with a black tuft, just reaching to the level of the hocks.

Horns long, slender, and gracefully curved, attaining a length of 26 or 27 inches.

Female similar to the male, but without horns.

Hab. Zambesia, extending northwards to Lake Mweru, and south-westwards to Lake Ngami.

Like the Poku the Lechee was first discovered by Livingstone and his companions Oswell and Murray, who travelled with him in 1849 on his first journey to Lake Ngami. After leaving the lake, on descending the valley of the River Zouga, he tells us (‘Missionary Travels,’ p. 71):—“We discovered an entirely new species of Antelope, called ‘lechè’ or ‘lechwi.’ It is a beautiful water-antelope of a light brownish-yellow colour. Its horns—exactly like those of the Aigoceros ellipsiprymnus, the water-buck, or ‘tumōga’ of the Bechuanas—rise from the head with a slight bend backwards, then curve forwards at the points. The chest, belly, and orbits are nearly white, the front of the legs and ankles deep brown. From the horns, along the nape to the withers, the male has a small mane of the same yellowish colour with the rest of the skin, and the tail has a tuft of black hair. It is never found a mile from water; islets in marshes and rivers are its favourite haunts, and it is quite unknown except in the central humid basin of Africa. Having a good deal of curiosity, it presents a noble appearance as it stands gazing with head erect at the approaching stranger. When it resolves to decamp, it lowers its head, and lays its horns down to the level with the withers; it then begins with a waddling trot, which ends in its galloping and springing over bushes like the pallahs. It invariably runs to the water and crosses it by a succession of bounds, each of which appears to be from the bottom. We thought the flesh good at first, but soon got tired of it.”

To accompany this description a steel plate, drawn by Wolf and engraved by Whymper (already alluded to in our account of the Poku), was given at the same page of the work. It represents a scene on the Zouga with males of the Lechee and Poku occupying a conspicuous position in the foreground, and a mixed herd of these two Antelopes, which are said to be frequently found together, on the reedy banks.

Fig. 36.

Head of Cobus lechee.

(From Mr. Selous’s mounted specimen in Brit. Mus.)

Oswell sent home to his friend Capt. Vardon a specimen of the new-found Antelope, and Capt. Vardon, as we find on reference to the minute-books of the meetings of the Zoological Society of London, exhibited it at the scientific meeting of that Society on June 11th, 1850. The species thus became included in Gray’s “Synopsis of Antelopes and Strepsiceres,” which was read on the same evening. A coloured plate by Joseph Wolf, attached to the Synopsis, was taken from Capt. Vardon’s specimen, which was subsequently presented to the British Museum.

The Lechee is also well figured by Wolf in a plate in Andersson’s ‘Lake Ngami,’ which contains an account of that traveller’s expedition to the Lake from the west coast in 1854. After a description of the animal Andersson says:—“The Leché is a Waterbuck, for though not actually living in the water, it is never found any distance from it. Great numbers are annually destroyed by the Bayeye, who convert their hides into a kind of rug for sleeping on, carosses, and other wearing apparel.”

The National Collection likewise contains a good mounted specimen of the male of this Antelope obtained by Mr. F. C. Selous at Umparira, on the Chobe, in 1881. In his paper on the Antelopes of Central South Africa, published in the Zoological Society’s ‘Proceedings’ for 1881, Mr. Selous gives us the following account of his experiences with the Lechee:—“This Antelope is first met with in the marshes of the Botletlie River, and is very numerous in the open grassy plains which are always more or less inundated by the Tamalakan, Mababe, Machabe, Sunta, and Chobe rivers. It is also common along the Upper Zambesi. In the swamps of the Lukanga River, about 150 miles to the south-west of Lake Bengweolo, which I visited in 1878, I found the Leegwee Antelope in large herds.

“After Speke’s Antelope, the Lechee is the most water-loving Antelope with which I am acquainted, and is usually to be seen standing knee-deep, or even up to its belly, in water, cropping the tops of the grass that appear above the surface, or else lying just at the water’s edge. As is the case with Tragelaphus spekii, the backs of the feet are devoid of hair between the hoof and the dew-claws, whilst in the Pookoo, as with all other Antelopes, this part is covered with hair. In some parts of the country Leegwee Antelopes are very tame; in others, where they are much persecuted by the natives, excessively wild. When they first make up their minds to run they stretch out their noses, the males laying their horns flat along their sides, and trot; but on being pressed they break into a springing gallop, now and then bounding high into the air. Even when in water up to their necks, they do not swim, but get along by a succession of bounds, making a tremendous splashing. Of course, when the water becomes too deep for them to bottom, they are forced to swim, which they do well and strongly, though not as fast as the natives can paddle; and when the country is flooded, great numbers are driven into deep water and speared. In the adult Leegwee the ears are of a uniform fawn-colour; but in the young animal they are tipped with black as in the adult Pookoo. In the flooded grassy plains in the neighbourhood of Linyanti on the Chobe, this beautiful Antelope may be seen in almost countless numbers, and I have counted as many as fifty-two rams consorting together. Some of these were quite young, with horns only a few inches in length; but there was not a single ewe amongst them. The longest pair of Leegwee horns that I have ever seen measured 2 feet 3 inches in length; but it is rare to get them over 2 feet long measured along the curve. In common with the Pookoo, they appear to me to be more tenacious of life than other Antelopes.”

As will be observed by what is said above, Mr. Selous has traced the Lechee beyond the Zambesi nearly as far north as Lake Bangweolo. Hence it extends into the basin of Lake Mweru, where Consul Sharpe met with it in “enormous herds” in company with Cobus vardoni. Specimens obtained by Mr. Sharpe in this district were forwarded by Sir Harry Johnston to Sclater, and are now in the British Museum.

We have, however, no evidence at present of the occurrence of the Lechee anywhere further north than the Mweru district. The specimens obtained by Petherick on the White Nile and assigned to Cobus lechee by Gray are, as already mentioned, properly referable to C. leucotis.

Our figure of this Antelope has been drawn by Smit from a sketch made by Wolf, and taken, we believe, from the original typical specimen now in the British Museum.

December, 1896.