t21-2 SOUTH AFRICAN MAMMALS 



The hips are adorned with a few white spots. The 

 fetlocks and feet are black. The tail is bushy, black above 

 and white below, and reaches to the hocks. Length 

 of head and body. 40 inches (Sclater) ; 51 to 60 inches 

 (F. 0. Xoome) ; height at shoulder, 42 inches ; length of 

 horns from -2-2 to 30 inches. Eecord .32J (Lourenco 

 Marques, F. 0. Xoome). The horns are much larger, 

 wider, and thicker than that of the Bushbuck's, and are 

 brown in colour with conspicuous pale yellow tips. The 

 female is much smaller than the male, has no horns, and 

 is of a bright, reddish, tawny colour, almost an orange ; 

 paler below and on the insides of the legs. A distinct 

 black dorsal line runs along the back from the crown of 

 the head to the root of the tail. She has usually more 

 white stripes on the sides, which are also more distinct 

 than those of the nmle. There is a black line on the face 

 but no white chevron. Mr. F. 0. Xoome of the Trans- 

 vaal Museum possesses a pair of horns which adorned a 

 female Xyala, which is the only case so far known. 



The head of an "^yala. with its manes of long hair 

 b'jth above and below the neck, its grand carriage and 

 fine horns, is to my mind, one of the finest trophies of 

 the hunter. It is, however, very local in habit, being 

 found only in the more well-watered and thickly wooded 

 and low lying tracts of Zululand, Portuguese East Africa 

 (north and south of Delagoa Bay) and north of the 

 Zambesi on the western bank of the Shire Eiver. The 

 Transvaal Museum obtained a number of fine specimens 

 in the M'Kuzi Game Eeserve of Zululand, and at Matopi 

 on the Maputo Paver, and Mr. F. 0. Noome of that 

 Institution possesses the record pair of horns, of which 

 I append a photograph. These animals are becoming 

 very scarce in some of their old haunts, as the writer 

 found to his cost in August, lOls, when he spent a few 



