“The Reem is remarkable for its light and uniform coloration, the ordinary Gazellemarkings being hardly noticeable. The long slender hoofs are also very peculiar, reminding one of those of Tragelaphus spekii, which lives in the swamps on the borders of lakes and rivers.
“It is quite certain that the Reem can never drink, as there is no water in this country at all, except in the comparatively deep wells dug by the natives.
“The following measurements of the male Reem were taken directly after it was killed:—Height at shoulder 2 ft. 4 in.; girth at brisket 2 ft. 1 in.; length of horns 13 in. It weighed, after being brought into camp (without entrails), 34 lb. These are about the measurements and weight of Gazella dorcas.
“For comparison I give the measurements of a good male Gazella cuvieri which I killed in the mountains a few weeks after the Reem:—Height at shoulder 2 ft. 7 in.; girth at withers 2 ft. 8½ in.; weight without entrails 58 lb.
“As to the distribution of these species, I may say that Gazella cuvieri is found entirely in the mountains, never down in the true desert. It climbs like a Chamois to the tops of the highest mountains in the rockiest ground, and is often found in the juniper-forests on the mountain-slopes. These are also the haunts of the Mouflon, the two animals being constantly seen on the same ground.
“Gazella dorcas is found all over the hard stony desert and also on the foot-hills, so that it sometimes overlaps the range of the Admi. I have seen a few in the sand-hills, the true country of the Reem; but I believe that still farther south it is not found, its place being taken entirely by the Reem. I quite believe the statement of the natives that the Reem is never found off the soft sand.”
On his return home Sir Edmund Loder submitted his series of specimens of the Gazelles obtained during this and his former journeys in Algeria to Thomas, who, at the same meeting of the Zoological Society at which Sir Edmund’s notes were read, proposed to refer his examples of the “Reem” to a new species to be called Gazella loderi, after the energetic traveller who first made known its existence in Algeria.
Mr. Pease, in his notes on the Antelopes of Eastern Algeria published in the Zoological Society’s ‘Proceedings’ for 1896, gives us the following additional information:—
“The Rhime (Gazella loderi), Arab ‘El Rhime,’ Tamahaq ‘Hankut,’ is the common Gazelle of the Sahara. Enormous numbers are killed by the Arabs in the neighbourhood of Rhadamis and their skins dressed and dyed with a dye made from the rind of pomegranates and exported from Rhadamis. They are to be found throughout the region of the great Ergs and everywhere in the Sahara sands where there is vegetation sufficient to support them. The only places where they are to be met with, north of El Oued Souf, are to the south-west of Bou Chaama and near Sef el Menadi. A number of their horns are always on sale at Biskra and sometimes the skins. The male horns of the Rhime sometimes bear so close a resemblance to those of the Admi (Gazella cuvieri) that they are often sold and bought as such.”
Mr. Pease also points out that in the “Rhime” the horns in their main outline form a long evenly tapering V, whilst in the Admi the horns are more inclined to be parallel, and towards the points usually take an inward and forward turn, as shown in the diagrams (Fig. 66, a, b) which by the kindness of the Zoological Society we are able to reproduce. The annulations, also, Mr. Pease states, are deeper and more marked in the Admi, and stop more abruptly towards the points than in the “Rhime.”