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.