54 NATURAL HISTORY ESSAYS 



is a true blaauwbok. The horns, longer and Tnore 

 slender than those of the roan, bear twenty-eight 

 rings : there is no black area on the face, nor any 

 anteocular switch of hair : the scanty mane is 

 directed forwards. The specimen is much 

 elongated, from faulty stuffing ; and it has also 

 been badly cut on one shoulder (perhaps from 

 carelessness in skinning it) : in spite of these 

 blemishes, however, it has a remarkably fresh 

 appearance, and certainly does not "look its age," 

 for even the famous bluish-purple tint yet lingers 

 on its century-old hide. The label bears the 

 inscription : 



" Hippotragus leucophaeus Pall : 

 Delgorgue. Afrique Australe." 



13. In 1799 a leucopheus was shot and sent to 

 Berlin. Dr. Lichtenstein described it in 18 14, 

 and it is fortunate that he did so, as it seems to 

 have since been lost — perhaps destroyed by some 

 person ignorant of its priceless value, like the dodo 

 in the museum at Oxford. When the doctor 

 wrote his account of this specimen (only a few 

 years after it had been shot) the whole blaauwbok 

 race had already disappeared from the face of the 

 globe — " blotted from the book of life," as Harris 

 expressed it long afterwards. 



14, 15, 16.'* "Some" were shot in 1800, accord- 

 ing to Lichtenstein, and their skins were sent to 

 Leyden, but nothing more is known about them. 



