NATURAL HISTORY OF SOUTH AFRICA 



innocent creatures, which enhven the desert-hke 

 parts of South Africa, should be distinctly 

 discouraged. 



The young are born in a nest in a rock cavity. 

 The number at a birth varies from two to three. 

 One which we kept in captivity gave birth to 

 two. On another occasion three were born. My 

 taxidermist, when skinning another, discovered 

 two within it. On yet another occasion we cap- 

 tured an adult female and three young ones, which 

 appeared to be about two months old. These were 

 all in the same lair, and evidently were the young of 

 the female which we found with them. 



It is an interesting sight to watch a family of 

 Dassies out upon the rocks in the sunshine. The 

 adults lie about, stretched out flat, ever and anon 

 rising on their haunches and glancing inquisitively 

 around, or stretching themselves, while the young 

 gambol in and out of the rocks, playing hide-and-seek 

 with each other, for all the world like domestic kittens 

 at play. Should a twig crack under you in your 

 lurking place, or should you inadvertently dislodge 

 a pebble, the shrill warning scream of a sentinel 

 rings out, and in an instant that happy family party 

 have vanished from sight. The Klip Dassie is not 

 only found among the bare or sparsely-covered stony 

 hills. I have found them in abundance in rocky 

 localities which were covered with a dense forest of 

 trees. In a close creeper-covered forest near Pieter- 

 maritzburg, known as the " Town Bush," where, 



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