THE VANISHING ELAND 217 



has happened already in the lower part of Southern 

 Africa, from which the great game may now be said 

 practically to have vanished ; and now the beginning 

 of the end is coming even to that local stronghold 

 the Kalahari itself. 



At the beginning of this century, the eland was 

 still plentiful in many parts of Cape CoJony. Barrow 

 found it on the Karroo ; and in 1813, Campbell, the 

 missionary explorer, mentions it as abounding 

 between Graafif Keinet and the Orange River. 

 Years before that time — in the early days of the 

 Dutch occupation — elands ran in great troops over 

 the whole country; and in Kolben's time (about 

 1700) were to be found close to the Cape Peninsula. 

 To this day, the former abundance of this goodly 

 beast is sufficiently attested by the frequency with 

 which river, plain, mountain, and kopje are to be 

 found bearing the name of '* Eland," not only in Cape 

 Colony, but in every corner of South Africa. 



But the eland, from its great size and astonishing 

 fatness, is the easiest of all the game to be destroyed. 

 Except in the case of lean, light cows, a gallop of a mile 

 or two on a decent horse is sufficient to run down the 

 pick of the troop. The skin, and especially the flesh, 

 which provides, perhaps, the finest venison in Africa, 

 have always been much sought after by all hunters, 

 and, in consequence, the eland has been exterminated 

 from one district to another until Mashonaland and 



