Part 43

Between the period of the discovery of the Sassaby by Burchell and the publication of its description this Antelope attracted the attention of another observer, Samuel Daniell, an artist who accompanied Dr. Somerville on two expeditions into the interior of the Cape Colony early in the present century. One of the copperplates engraved by William Daniell from the drawings made by his deceased brother Samuel, and published in 1820, gives a good representation of this species, which is stated in the accompanying letterpress to be “an Antelope, heretofore not described, found in the Booshwana country.” But no further particulars are given of it.

Hamilton-Smith, in his volume on the Ruminants, published in Griffith’s Translation of Cuvier’s ‘Règne Animal,’ correctly brought together Daniell’s “Sassaby” and Burchell’s Antilope lunata under one head and added a copy of Daniell’s figure.

Except in the quotations of its names by various systematists we find little more recorded of the Sassaby until 1840, when Capt. W. Cornwallis Harris gave an excellent account of it in his beautiful work on the ‘Game and Wild Animals of Southern Africa.’ This experienced sportsman and artist devoted one of his life-like plates to the representation of this Antelope, with which he had made himself well acquainted. “The Sassaybe,” he tells us, “like its congener, the Hartebeest, delights in the neighbourhood of hills, frequenting the open country with island-looking mimosa-groves, as well as the patches of scraggy forest that skirt the foot of many of the superior mountain ranges, which, however, neither species ever ascends. Among the parks of mokaala trees about the Cashan and Kurichane mountains we constantly saw them.” The painted skins of the Sassaby were in those days, Harris tells us, “in great request amongst the savages for kobos or leathern mantles, as well on account of their brilliant colours as from their extreme suppleness.” In this article of dress, Harris tells us, “the shining black tail, opened and squeezed flat, was usually fastened on so as to depend like a queue from the back of the neck, and the universal admiration in which this elegant appendage was held rendered its wearer the subject of many a quarrel.”

Very shortly after the publication of Harris’s ‘Portraits,’ Dr. Andrew Smith published his scientific account of the Sassaby in one of the numbers of his ‘Illustrations of the Zoology of South Africa.’ After an accurate description Dr. Smith well remarks that “between the appearances of the horns of the Sassaby and the Caama there are such marked differences, that we must at once conclude that no valid importance ought to be attached either to the form or direction of horns in the grouping of species. The subocular glands also differ materially in these two animals: in the Caama they are covered with short hair, similar to that of the other parts of the face; in the Sassaby they are without covering. In the Caama, the last portion of the tail is completely encircled with hair; in the Sassaby the sides and upper surface only are so furnished, the under surface being bare. In general appearance the two animals present a strong resemblance to each other.” Dr. Smith adds the following note on the habits of this species:--

“While B. caama seems to prefer the open grassy plains for its feeding-places, the Sassaby apparently delights to resort to situations in the vicinity of wood, or to such as are actually wooded, and in districts of the latter description large herds are often observed feeding among the dense brushwood without apparent concern. All the individuals we saw near to Latakoo were vigilant in watching our motions, and apparently little disposed to trust themselves within our reach; while those, again, on the other side of Kurrichane were comparatively tame, and though they did not actually resist our approach, yet they often continued in the situations in which we discovered them, until they were quite within the range of our guns; and even after being fired at they only retreated slowly, and rarely without frequently turning round as they retired to watch our movements. Their retreat, after each examination of the kind mentioned, was commonly preceded by some significant springs or strange gesticulations, such as are often made by common domestic cattle when they are put to flight by any object which excites their alarm. In point of manners, both the Sassaby and the Hartebeest show a considerable resemblance to the bovine tribe, and, except the Gnu, more so than any of the other Antelopes.”

Coming to more modern times, Mr. T. E. Buckley, in his excellent article on the “Geographical Distribution of South-African Mammals,” read before the Zoological Society of London in 1876, gives us the subjoined notes of his experience of this species:--“Although, in Harris’s time, the Sassaybe appears to have been common on the plains, at the present day it is essentially a bush-loving animal. According to Dr. A. Smith the Sassabye was rarely known to advance to the south of Latakoo; at present its southern limit appears to be the Amaswazi country; along the Limpopo it is very common, and continues so into the Matabili country up to the Zambesi. The old males do not seem to associate with the females; nor do they appear so common, as out of nearly a dozen obtained by us only two were males, and one of these was immature. We observed very young calves in October. The Sassabye runs with a peculiar gait, reminding one of a rocking-horse; its shoulders are very high, sloping away to the rump; it does not seem to be a very shy animal.”

Five years later the experienced African hunter and naturalist, Mr. F. C. Selous, in the same Journal, gives us the following notes on this Antelope:--“In travelling up the centre of South Africa, the first place in which the Sassaby is to be met with now-a-days is in the neighbourhood of the Marico River, a tributary of the Limpopo; and from there it is found throughout Central South Africa wherever I have been, south of the Zambesi, in all those parts of the country that are suitable to its habits. I say south of the Zambesi, because during my journey through the Manica country to the north of that river in 1877–78, although the terrain appeared well suited to its habits and requirements, I saw none of these Antelopes. I have heard, however, from the natives that they are very common in the neighbourhood of Sesheke.

“This Antelope is never found in hilly country or in thick jungle, but frequents the open downs that are quite free from bush, or else open forest-country in which treeless glades are to be met with. On the Mababe Flat at the end of the dry season large herds of these animals congregate together, and I have often seen, I am sure, several hundreds of them at once. They are, without exception, the fleetest and most enduring Antelope in South Africa. In 1879 all the Tsessebe and Blue Wildebeest cows calved on the northern bank of the Chobe during the first week in September, whilst on the Mababe Flat, only about one degree further south, the same animals did not calve before the first week in November.”

Mr. Bertram L. Sclater, R.E., who was at Beira for a week in April 1892, on his way home from Nyasaland, informs us that he was told in that town that the Sassaby is one of the commonest Antelopes on the banks of the Lower Pungwe, and that he was shown several frontlets of this species said to have been obtained between Beira and Chimoio. So far as we know, this is the furthest northern locality recorded for this species, which, as shown by Mr. Selous, does not appear to be found anywhere north of the Zambesi.

Head of supposed hybrid between Damaliscus lunatus and Bubalis caama.

(P. Z. S. 1893, p. 2.)]

At a meeting of the Zoological Society of London in January 1893 Mr. Selous made another interesting communication on this Antelope, exhibiting a skull which he believed to be that of a hybrid between it and the Hartebeest. This curious animal was shot in 1890 on the Tati River, Matabeleland, by Cornelius van Rooyen, a well-known Boer hunter. While this skull, which is now in the British Museum, closely resembles that of the Hartebeest, its horns partake of the characters of both the supposed parents. They stand nearly straight up from the skull as in the Hartebeest, but are slightly lunate in form and ringed as in the Sassaby. Mr. Selous was informed that the general colour of its skin was precisely that of the Sassaby, but that it carried the comparatively large bushy tail of the Hartebeest. As hybrids amongst the larger mammals are excessively rare in a wild state, this occurrence is well worthy of record, and we have to thank the Zoological Society for kindly permitting us to use their woodcut to illustrate it.

Besides the typical frontlet of this species in the British Museum, already mentioned, there are a mounted pair in the Gallery obtained by Dr. Andrew Smith, and skeletons of both sexes made from specimens shot on the Manyame River, Mashonaland, by Mr. Selous.

The Sassaby is rarely seen in captivity. So far as we know, the only specimens ever brought alive to Europe are two females imported by Mr. C. Reiche, of Alfeld, from the Transvaal in 1888. One of these was sold to the Amsterdam Gardens (where Sclater inspected it in April 1889), and the other to the Antwerp Gardens.

Our figure of this species (Plate X.) was put on the stone by Mr. Smit from a sketch made for Sir Victor Brooke by Mr. Wolf.

January, 1895.

GENUS III. CONNOCHÆTES.

Type.

Connochætes, =Licht.= Mag. nat. Freund. Berl. vi. p. 152 (1814) C. GNU. Cemas, =Oken=, Lehrb. Naturgesch. iii. Zool. pt. ii. p. 727 (1816) C. GNU. Catoblepas, =Ham. Sm.= Griff. Cuv. An. K. iv. p. 366 (1827) C. GNU. Gorgon, =Gray=, P. Z. S. 1850, p. 139 C. TAURINUS. Butragus, =Bly.= apud Gray, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 43 (1872) C. TAURINUS.

Size large, form thick and clumsy; the withers not disproportionately higher than the rump; head massive, with a broad and bristly muzzle; face with a large median tuft of thick black hairs uniting the suborbital tufts; nostrils widely separated, hairy within; neck maned; hoofs narrow; tail with its tuft reaching nearly to the ground, long-haired throughout; mammæ four.

Colour grey, brown, or black, the long hairs of the dorsal and throat manes and of the tail generally black, sometimes white.

Skull broad and heavy, not specially elongated; ends of premaxillæ expanded.

Horns present in both sexes; thickened and expanded at their bases; starting outwards or downwards for their proximal halves, their points abruptly curved upwards.

Range of the Genus. South and East Africa.

This genus, that of the curious and eccentric-looking animals known as Gnus, contains two very different sections, almost worthy of being considered distinct genera. One of these consists of two closely allied forms, the Brindled and White-maned Gnu, and the other of the White-tailed or “Common” Gnu, the most peculiar and specialized of all. Their differences may be summarized as follows:--

A. Hairs of facial tuft pointing downwards. Horns directed first outwards and then upwards. Tail black.

a. Throat-mane black 1. C. taurinus. b. Throat-mane whitish 2. C. albojubatus.

B. Hairs of facial tuft pointing upwards. Horns directed first downwards, and then recurved upwards. Tail white 3. C. gnu.