THE BROWN HY^NA 49 



10, ii. Two young specimens were preserved in 

 the British Museum in 1843 ; they had been born in 

 Liverpool perhaps in the Zoological Gardens 

 formerly existing there. 



12, 13. Two examples in the Jardin des Plantes. 

 One of these, though faded, is a good example of a 

 " clouded " hyaena ; perhaps it is Cuvier's specimen. 



Thus far the brown hyaena has been considered in 

 its relations to man ; its destructiveness to his cattle, 

 and ferocity towards his person. Let us now, setting 

 back the clock some centuries, picture it as it lived 

 on the sand-flats of the Cape, before the white man 

 began to colonise South Africa. 



Scene, the seashore in Southern Cape Colony : 

 time, A.D. 1652. An immense tract of sand glistens 

 white in the hot sunshine. On one hand rise 

 mountains of hard metamorphic sandstone ; on the 

 other, the heaving of the sea reflects in opal 

 brilliance the glorious southern sky. Everywhere 

 the land shows impress of the heat and glare of the 

 African sun ; the hills, of a general greyish or 

 brownish tint, are covered merely with bushes, not 

 with trees ; the very foliage is dusted brick red, and 

 the landscape swims in a heat haze. A small gorge, 

 watered by a tiny cascade and gay with ferns, affords 

 a pleasant relief to the eye, as do also the brilliant 

 little sun -birds veritable winged gems which 

 hover over the snowy blossoms of the protea bushes. 

 The chattering of a troop of baboons rises dully on 



