101. PETERS’S GAZELLE.
GAZELLA PETERSI, Günth.
Gazella granti, Peters, MB. Ak. Berl. 1879, p. 832, pl. v. (skull).
Gazella petersi, Günth. Ann. Mag. N. H. (5) xiv. p. 428 (1884); Lyd. Horns and Hoofs, p. 238 (1893); Jackson, in Badm. Big Game Shooting, i. p. 299 (1894); A. Neumann, Elephant-Hunting in E. Africa, pp. 9, 10 (figs., horns, ♂ ♀) (1898).
Gazella grantii var. gelidjiensis, Noack, Zool. Gart. xxviii. p. 277 (1887).
Vernacular Name:—Sala (Swahili) (Fischer).
Size large; height at withers about 33 inches. General colour and markings practically identical with those of the last species, Gazella granti, with the exception that the white rump-patch is of much less extent. This patch, which in G. granti is very broad, and projects prominently forward on each side, overhanging the dark pygal band, and passes across above the tail, separating that organ entirely from the dark dorsal colour, is in G. petersi divided above into two portions by an extension of the body-colour which runs down on to and along the top of the tail. Laterally the white is much narrower, and encroaches much less on the body-colour above, scarcely or not at all overhanging the pygal band.
Skull rather smaller than in G. granti, and the nasal opening rather narrower. Basal length in a male 9·3 inches, greatest breadth 4·2, muzzle to orbit 5·4.
Horns similar to those of G. granti, but smaller and more uniformly parallel, never widely divergent above. Horns of female about two-thirds the length of those of the male, slender and comparatively straight.
Hab. Coast-districts of British East Africa, from Mombasa northwards to beyond the Tana.
In a communication made to the Royal Academy of Sciences of Berlin in October 1879 the former Director of the Berlin Museum, the late Dr. Wilhelm Peters, gave an account of the specimens of Mammals collected in East Africa in 1878 by the well-known traveller Dr. G. A. Fischer. Amongst these were the skull and skin of a young male Gazelle obtained at Gelidja, near the mouth of the Osi and Tana Rivers, on June 27th, and stated to be called there by the Swahilis and Wapakomos “Sala.” Peters added to his paper on this subject an excellent lithographic plate of the skull and horns in question, which he referred, without much doubt, to Gazella granti, remarking, however, that the nose-spot was not well defined, and that the horns were straight at the base and not curved.