THE ANTELOPES AND GAZELLES 157 



To my mind there is no more beautiful sight in 

 the African veldt than a troop of these big, sleek, 

 prosperous-looking beasts. Although great in size, 

 and often very fat and in high condition, the beauti- 

 ful game-like heads and fine, clean antelopean limbs 

 always redeem these animals from the charge of being 

 little better than fat cattle. The eland is, of course, 

 a true antelope, and a magnificent species ; yet I 

 confess I never look at a herd of well-bred Alderney 

 or Jersey cattle, without being reminded irresistibly 

 of the fawn colouring and smooth, sleek coats of a 

 troop of eland. On the open downs and plains of 

 Eastern Mashonaland only a few years since great 

 troops of these splendid antelopes, numbering as many 

 as 100 or 200 head, were to be seen grazing con- 

 tentedly, like herds of prosperous beeves. Even in 

 the recesses of the waterless Kalahari I have met with 

 troops of these animals numbering between 30 and 40 

 head ; and although the season was winter and the 

 veldt dry and parched, the beasts shot by my hunting 

 friend and myself were fat and in most excellent 

 condition. Elands, in fact, beyond all other antelopes, 

 seem to possess the faculty of putting on flesh and 

 prospering. This fact has, lamentably enough, been 

 the cause of their downfall, wherever white men, 

 horses, and fire-arms have appeared ; and in South 

 Africa alone many thousands of these splendid 

 antelopes must have been shot within the last fifty 

 years. 



The eland is, to the mounted man, the easiest of 

 all animals to run down. One has to do no more 



