366 GIRAFFE GROUP 



with the ground-colour of their lower portion tawny. The frontal horn 

 is represented by a low tuberosity or swelling. 



This race differs from the southern giraffe, as represented by an old 

 bull formerly exhibited in the British Museum, by the lighter ground- 

 colour, the more net-like type of coloration, the browner colour of the 

 spots, and the greater degree to which the latter extend on to the sides 

 of the face. 



Whether posterior horns were developed, I have been unable to 

 ascertain. 



The ninth race is the North Transvaal giraffe {G. c. 2vardi), typified 

 by the body -skin of an adult bull presented by Mr. Rothschild to 

 the British Museum, together with the skull and mounted head 

 and neck of the same individual presented by Mr. Rowland Ward. 

 It is a large and dark chocolate -coloured giraffe, with the frontal 

 horn in old bulls represented by a low irregular boss (fig. 73), the 

 posterior, or occipital, horns enormously developed, and the body-spots 

 broken up into irregular stars, recalling those of G. c. tippelskirchi, 

 from which the present race (apart from the absence of a frontal horn) 

 is broadly distinguished by the dark chocolate -brown, instead of 

 chestnut, colour of the body-spots. The stellate character of these 

 spots widely distinguishes this race from the Cape giraffe, between 

 which and the East African G. c. tippelskirdii type it constitutes, how- 

 ever, a connecting link. So far as can be ascertained, the habitat of 

 this giraffe is quite isolated. The skull is remarkable for the extra- 

 ordinary development of the posterior, or occipital, horns, which are much 

 larger than in the Baringo giraffe ; and in possessing these appendages 

 the present race presents a marked contrast to the Lado and the Cape 

 races, in which they are wanting. The presence of posterior horns, 

 coupled with the abortion of the front horn, is thus a distinctive feature 

 of the present form, which might be called the four-horned giraffe. 



Lastly we have the southern race {G. c. capensis)^ from the 

 country immediately north of the Orange river and some of the 

 adjacent districts, of which the typical southern form is probably 

 extinct. This is a large dark-coloured giraffe, without posterior horns, 

 displaying the ' blotched type ' of colour-pattern in the most pronounced 

 form, with the two sexes alike as regards the pattern of the spots, but 

 the old bulls darker than the cows. As regards the spots, the large 

 chocolate-brown, or almost black, body-spots of the old bulls are more 

 or less quadrangular in shape, without showing any tendency to split 

 into stars, and form conspicuous dark blotches upon a tawny ground. 

 This type of colouring is thus the reverse of that of the Nubian race. 



