THE BUBALINE ANTELOPE. 



"Animal Africae proprium, vituli cervive quadam similtudine." 



Pliny on the bubaline antelope. 



The game animals of Algeria, though neither so 

 large nor so varied as those of Southern Africa, 

 nevertheless, from their existence so near to Europe, 

 have a special charm of their own. Probably they 

 once produced many a trophy for the Roman 

 amphitheatre, for in the old days elephants roamed 

 the wilderness of the Tell and haunted the Atlas 

 Mountains; 1 centuries afterwards lions still overran 

 the country in all directions, and panthers and 

 hyaenas infested the hill ravines. The caracal lynx 

 ranged the open Sahara after hare and bustard; the 

 hunting leopard ambushed the herds of antelope in 

 the wilderness of M'zab. The serval cat dwelt 

 among the tamarisks of Constantine ; the tiny fennec 

 fox haunted the dunes of Souf, and the cork forests 

 of Tunisia sheltered troops of Barbary stag and 

 sounders of wild boar. Gazelles of various species 

 replaced in the southern valleys the springbok of 

 austral Africa ; the beautiful addax, spiral-horned 

 and silver-coated, frequented the saline marshes to 

 lick the salt; 2 while the fertile pastures and open 



1. Hanno mentions herds of elephants, seen on the coast of Morocco, 

 in his voyage of B.C. 470 ; in Algena these animals persisted till between 

 300 and 700 A.D. 



2. One of these salt lakes will be found figured from a photograph in 

 "Natural History Essays." 



