218 ON STREPSICEROS KUDU 



la a somewhat older male of Str. kudu, died in Amster- 

 dam (March 1879) and at present in our Museum, the fol- 

 lowing dimensions are not without interest: 



era. 

 Length of horns (no trace of spirature) 23 

 Distance between their tips . . . . 31 

 Circumference at the base 14 



The horns of the young kudu are round at the base 

 and show no trace of the well developed prominent angu- 

 lation in the imherhis of about the same age and in the 

 older ^Mi^M-specimen. Very remarkable is the different posi- 

 tion of the horns with respect to the skull , resp. to the 

 head ; in the young kudu the horns are placed nearly in 

 one plain with nose and forehead , about like in Anoa 

 depressicornis , meanwhile in the young imherhis they form 

 an angle with the head, about like in Portax picta. 



The fur of the imherhis generally is much more lively 

 colored, with a darker hue and the white stripes and ditto 

 patches are more prominent. This darker hue results from 

 the fact that the kudu has the hairs uniformly colored 

 from base to tip , a few hairs having black tips , meanwhile 

 in imherhis, with a few exceptions, all the hairs are black- 

 tipped: moreover the brown color in kudu may be called 

 a dirty rufous and in imherhis a fine chestnut. 



The dark colored mane running from between the horns 

 along the spine of the back pass away at a certain distance 

 above the shoulders and is substituted by a pure white line 

 ending at a short distance from the base of the tail : in 

 our young kudu this white line is interrupted near its end 

 by broad dark colored stripes. 



From this white line descend the well known stripes , 

 pure white and very striking in imherhis , dirty white and 

 very indistinct , often nearly imperceptible , in kudu : the 

 number of these stripes is very inconstant and is different 

 on both sides in the same specimen , but always much 

 greater in imherhis than in kudu : in our young imherhis 

 there are 12 stripes on the right side and 13 on the left, 



^otes from the Leyden Museum, Vol. XII. 



