THE EXTINCT QUAGGA 



When the Dutch first colonised that part of Africa of 

 which Cape Town now forms the capital, they found the 

 country absolutely swarming with a great variety of species 

 of large game and other animals, whose form and appear- 

 ance were for the most part unfamiliar. As they them- 

 selves came from a land which had long since been stripped 

 of the larger members of its fauna, it is possible that 

 unfamiliarity with these prototypes was one of the causes 

 which led to the indiscriminate and often inappropriate 

 bestowal of the names of the large mammals of Europe, 

 or compounds of the same, on the animals of the new 

 country. What, for instance, can be more inappropriate 

 than the transference of the Dutch name for elk (eland) 

 to the largest of the Cape antelopes — unless, indeed (which 

 is scarcely likely), the settlers were acquainted with the 

 fact that etymologically the word signifies, in its Greek 

 original, " strength " ? Neither is hartebeest (stag-ox) much 

 better, although wildebeest (wild ox) is by no means an 

 unsuitable designation for the animals known to the 

 Hottentots by the title of gnu. Bastard hartebeest, on 

 the other hand, is a cumbrous and senseless name for the 

 antelope the Bechuanas call tsessabe, and it is much to 

 be regretted that the Boers did not see fit to adopt for 

 South African animals the native titles they found ready 



to hand. 



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