56 ZEBRAS, QUAGGAS, AND ASSES 



name of qua-cha" But all travellers and hunters speak of the quagga 

 as a true lover of the wide and open plains, revelling in a perfect state 

 of unrestricted freedom. In his Wild Sports of Southern Africa 

 Cormvallis Harris states that the quagga was still found within the 

 Cape Colony, where it inhabits the open plains south of the Vaal 

 river in immense herds. In another passage he writes : " Moving 

 slowly across the profile of the ocean-like horizon, uttering a shrill 

 barking neigh, of which its name forms a correct imitation, long files 

 of quaggas continually remind the early traveller of a rival caravan on 

 its march." Inquiries made by Mr. H. A. Bryden of old Dutch and 

 British farmers in Cape Colony, who remembered the quagga in the 

 wild state, confirm the statement that the species was habitually a 

 dweller upon the wide karoos and plains. 



THE BONTE-QUAGGA OR BURCHELL'S ZEBRA 



(Equus burchellt) 



Quagga OR Bonte-Quagga, CAPE DUTCH; Peetsi OR'Peetsi 

 Folatsar, BECHUANA 



(PLATE ii, fig. 3) 



Although the typical southern race of the exceedingly variable 

 species known scientifically as Equus burchelli is commonly called 

 Burchell's zebra, it is much better designated by its Boer title of bonte- 

 quagga (i.e. striped or painted quagga), since this obviates the use of 

 such exceedingly ill-sounding and inconvenient names as " Chapman's 

 Burchell's zebra." The species is closely allied to the quagga, from 

 which, indeed, it is perhaps not really separable ; but the stripes are 

 always well developed on the hind-quarters, where they present the 

 characters mentioned under the heading of the last-named animal. 

 Bonte-quagga display remarkable variation in colouring and markings 

 as we proceed from south to north ; the typical southern race having 

 dark brown stripes with intervening brown " shadow-stripes " on an 

 orange ground, and unstriped legs, whereas in the northern race the 

 stripes, which are black on a white ground, extend right down to the 

 hoofs, and have no intervening shadow-stripes. 



In all cases the upper extremities of some five or six stripes on 

 the hind half of the body are bent backwards parallel to the dorsal 

 stripe ; while the light area between these body-stripes and the dorsal 



