96 RUMINATING ANIMALS. 



n oonday. These herds change their pasture according 

 to its freshness and duration : they migrate in search 

 of new food, and, like the locusts, mark the tract 

 which they pursue ; woe to the colonist whose ten- 

 der corns grow in the passage of these migratory 

 troops, his efforts are unavailing, the destruction of 

 the food alone drives them off. * In Europe, a few 



* The following note, extracted from Thompson's Tra- 

 vels in South Africa, is descriptive of one of this graceful 

 tribe, and is curious in detailing the migrations which they 

 seem to perform periodically : 



" It is scarcely possible for a person passing over some 

 of the extensive tracts of the interior, and admiring that 

 elegant antelope the Springbok, thinly scattered over the 

 plains, and bounding in playful innocence, to figure to him- 

 self, that these ornaments of the desert can often become 

 as destructive as the locusts themselves. The incredible 

 number which sometimes pour in from the north, during 

 protracted droughts, distress the farmer inconceivably. 

 Any attempt at numerical computation would be vain ; 

 and by trying to come near the truth, the writer would 

 subject himself, in the eyes of those who have no knowledge 

 of the country, to a suspicion that he was availing himself 

 of a traveller's assumed privilege. Yet it is well known in 

 *he interior, that, on the approach of the Trek-bokken, the 

 grazier makes up his mind to look for pasturage for his 

 flocks elsewhere, and considers himself entirely dispossessed 

 of his lands until heavy rains fall. Every attempt to save 

 his cultivated fields, if they be not enclosed by high and 

 thick hedges, proves abortive. Heaps of dry manure (the 

 fuel of the Sneeuwbergen and other parts) are placed close 

 to each other round the fields, and set on fire in the even- 

 ing, so as to cause a dense smoke, by which it is hoped the 

 antelopes will be deterred from their inroads ; but the dawn 

 of day exposes the inefficacy of the precautions, by shew- 

 ing the lands, which appeared proud of their promising 



