Of the Blessbok, so far as I know, Lord Derby never procured for the Knowsley Menagerie but a single female, which was figured by Waterhouse Hawkins on the same plate of the ‘Gleanings’ as the Bonteboks. At the sale of the Knowsley Menagerie in August 1851, this animal was purchased by Mr. Westermann for the Zoological Society of Amsterdam. In 1861 the Zoological Society of London received, as a present from Sir George Grey, then Governor of the Cape Colony, a single female of this Antelope along with other valuable animals. A male of the same species was obtained by purchase in 1862 and a female about two years later. These animals throve and bred in the Society’s Gardens, and young ones were born in 1866, 1869, and 1870. But in the absence of fresh importations the whole stock was lost, and no Blessboks have been exhibited in the Society’s Gardens since 1880, when a single specimen was received “on deposit.” In many of the continental gardens also Blessboks were formerly to be seen, but of late years they have become extremely scarce; although we are informed that there are still solitary examples living at Berlin, Antwerp, and Amsterdam, and Mr. Reiche kindly tells us that he imported three females from the Transvaal this summer.
In the National Collection at the British Museum the Blessbok, we regret to say, is even more imperfectly represented than the Bontebok. Besides a mounted female specimen in bad condition there are only a few frontlets of this species, so that additional specimens of this beautiful Antelope, before it becomes quite extinct, would be specially acceptable.
The drawing of this Antelope (Plate IX.) and the woodcut now given (p. 82) were both prepared under Sir Victor Brooke’s directions. The Plate was engraved by Smit from one of Mr. Wolf’s sketches.
January, 1895.
THE BOOK OF ANTELOPES. PL. X.
Wolf del. Smit lith.
Hanhart imp.
The Sassaby.
DAMALISCUS LUNATUS.