FUR-FARMING IN CANADA 121 
of our domestic animals are too large for immediate consumption by the 
ordinary farmer’s family; and there is a distinct demand for a food 
animal of smaller size than the sheep for farm use. Some of the smaller 
African antelopes, as the red duiker, might perhaps be made to supply 
the demand. 
In Africa there are nearly a hundred species of the antelope family, 
many of them hardy and some of them producing the best of venison. 
More than a dozen species would be promising subjects for experiments 
in acclimatizing and breeding in America. Some of them for instance, 
as the gazelle, undoubtedly would be found especially adapted for the 
arid range country of the Southwest and might be used to restock parts 
of the country from which the American antelope has disappeared. 
The eland is the largest of the antelope family and is threatened 
with extermination in South Africa. The average weight of this animal 
is from 800 to 1,100 pounds and old males sometimes attain 1,400 to 
1,500 pounds. The eland has often been recommended for experiments 
in domestication. It was first introduced into Holland in 1783 by the 
Prince of Orange. It was acclimatized in England by the Earl of Derby 
in 1842 and was bred successfully in his parks. At his death his herd 
passed into the possession of the London Zoological Society in 1851, and 
continued to increase in numbers for many years. In 1879, the Duke of 
Bedford had a fine herd of 14 elands in his park at Woburn Abbey. 
The flesh of the eland is highly eulogized by Harris the African tra- 
veller in these words: ‘“ Both in grain and colour it resembles beef, but 
it is far better tasted and more delicate, possessing a pure game flavour 
and exhibiting the most tempting looking layers of fat and lean, the 
surprising quantity of the former ingredient with which it is interlarded, 
exceeding that of any other game quadruped with which I am ac- 
quainted. The venison fairly melts in the mouth, and as for the brisket, 
that is absolutely a cut for a monarch.” 
Besides the eland, the sambar, the nilgai, and other foreign deer 
have given promising results when bred in enclosures. All told, there 
are perhaps 150 species of exotic ungulata useful for food, that might 
become promising subjects for experiments in acclimatizing and breed- 
ing in the United States. The cost of introducing and caring for ten or 
more of each species until acclimated would be small when compared 
with the important 1esults that would follow success with even a very 
few species. 
For those who would engage in growing deer for profit, however, 
we can recommend in preference to exotic species our native elk, or 
wapiti, and the Virginia deer. They need no acclimatizing and are, 
without question, adapted for propagation in this country. 
