PREFACE xi 



no two cases are quite alike, each species being largely a 

 law unto itself. Generalizations concerning habits and dis- 

 tribution are accordingly very difficult to prove true until 

 much investigation has been undertaken concerning all the 

 species or groups concerned. The distribution of one species 

 may depend upon the distribution of its food plants or ani- 

 mals, of another upon its natural enemies, of another upon 

 climatic conditions; while yet others may be limited in dis- 

 tribution only by natural boundaries such as large bodies 

 of water or high mountains. Usually the factors consist 

 of a combination of some of these or all of them acting in 

 varying degrees. 



Again, take the question of the extent to which an ani- 

 mal is nocturnal. In our observations on African game we 

 were not able to make out whether or not under natural 

 conditions some of the antelopes were more nocturnal than 

 others. But in American game this is certainly the case. 

 The whitetail deer will often feed at all hours of the night, 

 as we can personally testify, and this when there is no moon. 

 But Mr. Shiras informs us that moose do not feed — at least 

 by the water's edge — later than ten or eleven at night; 

 whereas the whitetail will continue feeding until dawn. 

 Caribou are diurnal. Wapiti feed freely in moonlight, but 

 move about very little on moonless nights. Blacktail move 

 about more freely on dark nights than wapiti, but hardly 

 as freely as whitetail. 



The chief purpose of the present publication is to give 

 our own observations, and in some cases to add what is 

 already known, regarding the life-histories of African game 

 animals, so that sportsmen who combine love of hunting 

 with a taste for faunal natural history, and outdoor ob- 



