After General Hardwicke, the late Sir Walter Elliot was among the first of the British residents in India who turned his special attention to the zoology of British India. In 1839 he published an excellent article upon the mammals of the Southern Mahratta country. Here, he tells us, the Indian Antelope “frequents the plains in herds of from twenty to thirty, each of which contains only one buck of mature age, the others being young ones.” In some cases the herds are so large that one buck has fifty or sixty does in its company, while the younger bucks, driven away by the old ones, wander about in separate herds, which sometimes contain as many as thirty individuals of different ages.
Jerdon, in his ‘Mammals of India,’ published in 1867, following Gray, calls the Indian Antelope Antilope bezoartica, but gives us a good account of it. It is found, he says, throughout India in suitable localities, but is not met with elsewhere. “It is rare in Bengal, a few only extending into Purneah and Dinagepore, north of the Ganges; and it does not occur in the richly wooded Malabar coast. It is abundant in the Deccan, in parts of the Doab between the Jumna and Ganges, also in Hurriana, Rajpootana, and the neighbouring districts. It is found in the Punjab, but does not cross the Indus.”
McMaster, in his ‘Notes on Jerdon’s Mammals,’ and Sterndale, in his ‘Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon,’ besides numerous other writers in the ‘Bengal Sporting Magazine’ and other periodicals, have published good field-notes upon the Black-buck, which is perhaps the most favourite object of pursuit of the sportsman in the plains of India. But one of the best summaries of all these observations is that put together by General Kinloch in his excellent work on ‘Large Game Shooting in Thibet, the Himalayas, Northern and Central India,’ from the third edition of which, published in 1892, we venture to quote the following extracts:—
“The Indian Antelope, the male of which is universally known among sportsmen as the ‘Black Buck,’ is generally distributed throughout India, being found from the foot of the Himalayas to the extreme south of the mainland, and from Eastern Bengal to the River Jhílam. There are, however, large tracts of country where it is not found, and it is essentially an inhabitant of the open cultivated plains, avoiding equally hills and dense jungles. The localities in which I know it to be most abundant are the desert near Ferózpúr, in the Hissár District, and in the neighbourhood of Álígarh. The male is one of the most graceful and beautiful animals in creation, combining symmetry of form and brilliancy of coloring with marvellous speed and elasticity of movement. He stands about thirty-two inches at the shoulder, and when arrived at maturity the upper parts are of a deep glossy black, with the exception of a light chestnut-colored patch at the back of the neck, and some markings of the same color about the face. The lower parts and the inside of the limbs are snowy white, and the line between the black and white is most clearly defined. The hair is short and glossy, and the skin makes a very pretty mat. The horns are remarkably handsome, being spiral and annulated nearly to their tips. They vary considerably in length, in degree of spirality, in the number and prominence of rings, and in the angle at which they diverge. In Southern India they are said rarely to attain a greater length than twenty inches, but in the Panjáb they have been found very much longer. I have seen two pairs of twenty-seven inches, and have heard of horns over twenty-eight in length. Young bucks are of a light fawn color, their coats gradually becoming darker with age, although I have seen full-grown buck with long horns which had hardly a black hair. The doe is of a light fawn above and white beneath, with a light-colored line along the side; she is not furnished with horns, except in very rare instances. When horns do appear they are slender and much curved, bearing no resemblance to those of the buck. Antelopes delight in extensive open plains where there are alternate wide tracts of cultivation and waste land, repairing as a rule to the fields for food, and resting when they can on bare and sandy soil. During the rainy season, however, they are fond of concealing themselves among high-standing crops, and only come out in the mornings and evenings. Black Buck are very pugnacious, and sometimes fight so desperately that they will allow a person to walk close up to them without observing him. Many have their horns broken in their combats, and I have seen one both of whose horns were broken off within three inches of the head. Antelopes are usually found in considerable herds, varying in numbers from ten or a dozen to a couple of hundred. A buck and one doe, or a buck and a couple of does, may, however, be frequently met with; and vast herds of many thousands have occasionally been seen. When in large numbers they of course do much damage to the crops, and it is with difficulty that the natives drive them away. It is a beautiful sight when a herd of Antelopes are first alarmed; as soon as they have made up their minds that safety is only to be found in flight, first one, then another bounds into the air to a surprising height, just touching the earth, and again springing upwards, until the whole herd are in motion. So light are their movements that they seem as if they were suspended on wires. These bounds are only continued for a few strides, after which the Antelopes generally settle down into a regular gallop. The speed of the Black Buck is wonderful, and it is seldom that greyhounds can pull down an unwounded one; but I knew one dog that caught several, both bucks and does, on fair ground. Antelopes will go away when very hard hit, and a wounded one will often give a capital run, if ridden after with spear or knife; the latter is nearly as good as the former, for the buck runs so game, that he will not, as a rule, give a chance of spearing him until he is so completely exhausted that he drops with fatigue, when one may dismount and cut his throat. The sportsman can choose between riding down or coursing his wounded Antelope; but either a good horse or a brace of greyhounds should always be in readiness, or the best shot will have the mortification of seeing maimed animals escape to die a lingering death.”
The chase of the Black-buck by the Cheetah (Cynælurus jubatus) is a favourite sport of the native Princes and Nobles of India. General Kinloch, in the work we have just quoted, describes one of these chases, in which he took part, as follows:—
“Early one morning at the beginning of June, M. (a brother Officer) and I rode out with the Chítá cart, and had not proceeded very far across the fields, which were then almost destitute of vegetation, when some Black Buck were discovered in the distance. M. then took his seat beside the keeper of the cart, while I rode alongside, taking care to keep the cart between me and the Antelope. The herd had evidently been hunted before, and in spite of careful manœuvring would never allow us to approach within a hundred and fifty yards, which the keeper considered too great a distance for a successful slip. Several other antelope were followed with a similar result, but at last a herd that were grazing in a very rough field permitted the bullocks to trot up to within a hundred yards. The Chítá was now unhooded, and on catching sight of the game he sprang lightly from the cart, but instead of at once giving chase, he walked quietly towards the Antelope, which, being now alarmed, were rapidly increasing their distance. I began to think that he had no intention of pursuing, and the Antelope were nearly two hundred yards off, when he gradually increased his speed, and after a few strides bounded after them with such amazing velocity that in a few seconds he was in the middle of the now flying herd. Passing several small ones, he singled out one of the finest buck, and in less time than it takes to describe it buck and Chítá rolled over in a cloud of dust. The chase had not extended much over three hundred yards. Galloping to the spot, I found the buck lying on his back, while the Chítá crouched quietly by him with his fangs buried in the throat. The keeper quickly came up, terminated the buck’s existence with his knife, and catching the blood in a wooden ladle, presented it to the Chítá, who lapped it up with relish. A haunch was then cut off, and the Chítá seizing it bounded back into his cart, where he proceeded to devour it at his leisure. The buck was a fine one, with twenty-three inch horns.”
Excellent accounts of the distribution and habits of the Indian Antelope have also been lately published in Dr. Stanford’s ‘Mammals of British India,’ and in the second volume of ‘Big Game Shooting’ in the Badminton Library. In the latter we find described the following curious method of getting within close range of the Black-buck as practised in Central India:—
“A trained Black-buck and doe are taken out, each having a light cord about ten yards long attached to it, and the pair are led by an attendant, a light screen about three feet square made of grass and leaves with a small hole in the centre being carried by the shikari. The whole party moves under cover of a third man on horseback to within about three hundred yards of a herd of antelopes. The screen is then planted on a spot commanding a good view; the men on foot crouch behind it, and the horseman rides slowly off on the flank. The two tame Antelopes are then let out to the full extent of their lines on one side of the screen, and begin playing round one another. The master buck of the herd, seeing an impertinent intruder on his ground, trots out at once to do battle for the doe, but the screen puzzles him, so before coming close he generally circles round to try and see behind it. As he moves, the screen is shifted round, the men scrambling round on hands and knees behind it, and if there are two Englishmen bursting with suppressed laughter in addition to the two natives, all scuffling round as the screen moves and trying to keep their legs out of sight, the business is most comical. Directly the wild buck stops, the screen and the men behind it must remain motionless. Having failed to discover what is behind the screen, the buck, though he is still suspicious, feels that he must try to capture that enticing doe, but decides on having a look on the other side of the screen first, so back he gallops to the other flank, and the scrambling process is repeated. Gradually he comes within range, the rifle is poked through the hole in the screen and he gets his quietus. After this the tame Antelopes are given a handful of corn, and the party sets out to look for another herd. The tame buck employed in this manœuvre should be a brown one, as if an old powerful-looking black one is used the wild buck will often decline the contest.”
The Indian Antelope bears captivity easily, and specimens of it are to be seen in all the Zoological Gardens of Europe, in some of which it has bred and multiplied very successfully. In other places it has not done so well, apparently requiring a light soil and a considerable amount of protection from the inclemencies of a northern climate.
In the celebrated Menagerie at Knowsley fifty years ago this Antelope is stated by Gray to have bred but once at the time he was writing of it (1846). But shortly afterwards the herd of this animal in Lord Derby’s possession appears to have increased very rapidly. When the Menagerie was dispersed by auction after the Earl’s death in 1851 we find that four males and four females of this Antelope were entered in the sale-list, all described as having been bred at Knowsley. These passed into the possession of the late Viscount Hill, of Hawkstone, who at that epoch shared Lord Derby’s tastes in his love for keeping living animals.