Part 29

Boselaphus caama, =Scl.= P. Z. S. 1884, p. 539; =id.= in James, Unknown Horn of Afr. p. 262 (1888).

Alcelaphus, sp. inc., =Lort Phillips=, P. Z. S. 1885, p. 932.

Alcelaphus caama, =Gigl.= Ann. Mus. Genov. (2) vi. p. 19 (1888) (Shoa).

Bubalis swaynei, =Scl.= P. Z. S. 1892, p. 98, pl. v. (head), pp. 118, 257; =Swayne=, P. Z. S. 1892, p. 303 (habits and distribution); =Ward=, Horn Meas. p. 60, fig. (head) (1892); =Lyd.= Horns and Hoofs, p. 198, fig. 39 (head) (1893).

VERNACULAR NAME:--“Sig” of Somalis (Lort Phillips).

Size medium, height at withers about 47 inches. General colour a peculiar pale chocolate-brown, finely speckled over with white, each hair being brown with the extreme tip white. Face black, except a line across between the eyes to lips and tip of nose, which are fawn-coloured. Chin black. Shoulders and all round forearms black; there is also a black patch inside and a less distinct one outside the thighs. Lower legs and feet fawn, except that the backs of the pasterns are black. Hams paler than back, but not white and not sharply defined. Tail with its hairs reaching just to the hock, black-edged above for its terminal half.

Hairs of face reversed upwards for only about 1½ inch on the tip of the muzzle, then directed downwards from a whorl just below the bases of the horns. Glandular suborbital brushes prominent.

Skull of medium proportions; its measurements as follows:--basal length 14·5 inches, greatest breadth 5·5, muzzle to orbit 8·3, facial length 14, breadth of forehead 3·5.

Horns bracket-shaped, the median portion of each in nearly the same straight line as that of its fellow; terminal portion very short. In length good male horns attain to about 18 inches.

Hab. Interior of Northern Somaliland and Shoa.

Although this fine Hartebeest was pursued and slain by several energetic hunters before Captain Swayne met with it in Somaliland, it is to the last-named distinguished explorer that we are indebted for our first perfect specimens and for an account of its range and habits, and it is therefore appropriately named after him.

The first evidence received of the occurrence of a Hartebeest in Somaliland was a flat native skin contained in a collection brought home by Herr Menges along with a lot of living animals imported for Mr. Hagenbeck, of Hamburg. In some notes on these skins (P. Z. S. 1884, p. 539) Sclater referred the specimen in question to B. caama. Again, Mr. E. Lort Phillips, F.Z.S., who was one of Mr. James’s party in Somaliland in the winter of 1885, shot a single young male Hartebeest near the northern boundary of the high plateau south of Berbera in April of that year (see P. Z. S. 1885, p. 932), but unfortunately lost the skull which he had preserved, and did not meet with the species again.

The next record of this Hartebeest is from a different locality. The Italian naturalist Dr. Traversi in 1886 transmitted to Florence a Hartebeest’s head which, in his list of Traversi’s collection, Dr. Giglioli referred to B. caama. After examining the specimen in the Museum of Florence, and receiving a drawing of it from Dr. Giglioli, Sclater (see P. Z. S. 1892, p. 258) was able to assure himself that it was in all probability the same as B. swaynei of Somaliland.

In his “Field-notes” on the Antelopes of Somaliland (P. Z. S. 1892, p. 303) Captain Swayne furnishes us with an excellent account of this animal, which we now reproduce:--

“South of the highest ranges of Somaliland, and at a distance of about 100 miles from the coast, are open plains some four or five thousand feet above the sea-level, alternating with broken ground covered with thorn-jungle, with an undergrowth of aloes growing sometimes to a height of six feet.

“This elevated country, called the ‘Haud,’ is waterless for three months, from January to March; it was crossed by Mr. James’s party in 1884, when their camels were thirteen days without water.

“Much of the Haud is bush-covered wilderness or open semi-desert, but some of the higher plains are, at the proper season, in early summer, covered, far as the eye can reach, with a beautiful carpet of green grass, like English pasture-land. At this time of the year pools of water may be found, as the rainfall is abundant.

“This kind of open grass country is called the ‘Ban.’ Not a bush is to be seen, and some of these plains are thirty or forty miles each way.

“There is not always much game to be got at in the Haud; but a year ago, coming on to ground which had not yet been visited by Europeans, I found one of these plains covered with herds of Hartebeests, there being perhaps a dozen herds in sight at one time, each containing three or four hundred individuals. Hundreds of bulls were scattered singly on the outskirts and in spaces between the herds, grazing, fighting, or lying down.

“The scene I describe was at a distance of over a hundred miles from Berbera; and the game has probably been driven far beyond that point by now.

“The Hartebeest bulls are very pugnacious, and two or three couples may be fighting round the same herd at one time. Often one of the bulls will be sent rolling head over heels.

“The easiest way to get a specimen is to send a couple of Midgans round above the wind to drive the Hartebeest towards you, at the same time lying down in the grass. A shot may be got within fifty yards, but no one would care to shoot many Hartebeests, as the trophy is poor.

“Often Oryxes and Sœmmerring’s Gazelles are seen in company with these great troops of Hartebeests, but the Oryxes are much wilder. The Hartebeests are rather tame, and they and the Sœmmerring’s Gazelles are always the last to move away.

“Hartebeests have great curiosity, and rush round a caravan, halting now and then within two hundred yards to gaze. This sight is an extraordinary one, these Antelopes having heavy and powerful forequarters, head, and chest, of a different shade of chestnut to the hindquarters, which are poor and fall away. In the midday haze on the plains they look like troops of Lions.

“The pace of the Hartebeest is an ungraceful lumbering canter; but this species is really the fleetest and most enduring of the Somali Antelopes. The largest herd I have ever seen must have contained a thousand individuals, packed closely together, and looking like a regiment of cavalry, the whole plain round being dotted with single bulls. Their coats are glossy, like that of a well-groomed horse.

“From their living so much in open grass plains the Hartebeests must subsist entirely on grass, for there is nothing else to eat; and they must be able to exist for several days without water.

“Hartebeests are the favourite food of Lions, and once, when out with my brother, I found a troop of three Lions sitting out on the open plains, ten miles from the nearest bush. They had evidently been out all night among the herds, and on their becoming gorged, the rising sun had found them disinclined to move.

Skull of Bubalis swaynei.