BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 337 



It was nearly night when we returned towards our camp, 

 Punyer having shot a fine male specimen of the blessbock. 

 After we had skinned him in the best manner during the 

 dusk, we proceeded homewards, laden with trophies of our 

 sport, but not without falling many times over large ant 

 hills, or sinking into holes made by the ant-eaters, it being 

 very dark. 



A pair of kafir cranes, Grus Pavonia, the first we had seen 

 during our journey, repeatedly pronounced their name, " Ma- 

 hem, Mahem," as they passed over our camp. These birds 

 are so called by the Kossa Kaffirs in allusion to the sound 

 they utter. It seems they usually resort to that pond 

 during night, and were deprived of that convenience, since 

 we encamped so near it. As we were leaving our station 

 again the next morning, steering in the same easterly direc- 

 tion as the former day, we beheld before us, at a moderate 

 distance, the mountain range, running in a north-easterly 

 direction, but sloping down considerably. About a dozen 

 wild dogs, (Lycaon typicus, Smith), an animal nearly the size 

 of our European wolf, and of a similar slender form, was 

 disturbed by our waggons among some sedges where they 

 had concealed themselves, most likely after they had made 

 an early breakfast. Their swiftness is astonishing when they 

 are racing after antelopes ; neither the fleet springbock, the 

 hartebeest nor the blessbock escapes ; they pursue, through 

 thousands of other game, the one with which they have com- 

 menced the race, nor cease till it falls a victim. Ruppel's 

 Lycaon pictus is found also in South Africa ; though rare, I 

 have seen several times small troops about the forests towards 

 the eastern frontier. The striped hyaena, which is frequently 

 met with towards northern Africa, is likewise uncommon 

 m South Africa. I had only once an opportunity of getting 

 a specimen during a night-hunt, with the assistance of a pack 

 °f faithtul dogs, near the Bushman River. 



Travelling over an undulated country, the depressed 

 Parts were often intersected with trenches, caused by heavy 



VOL. V. C C 



