LELWEL HARTEBEEST 107 



sometimes be obtained. In this country, too, a mounted man, hidden 

 by the giraffe-acacia groves, and knowing that the game will almost 

 invariably make up-wind, is enabled to cut off corners and come up 

 with the troop even when running ; and I have cut a troop completely 

 in half in this way, and seen its members standing at 150 yards' 

 distance for a few moments completely bewildered, thus affording a 

 steady shot. Still, it must be confessed that hartebeests are extremely 

 wary antelopes, possessed of marvellous powers of scent and hearing, 

 so that, on the whole, they have managed to maintain their ground 

 against the hunters, at least as well as most other South African beasts 

 of chase far better, in fact, than a good many ; the desert nature of 

 much of their habitat having, no doubt, aided them in prolonging the un- 

 equal struggle against the advance of civilisation. No antelope is more 

 tenacious of life, or will more often succeed in running long distances, 

 and even making good its escape, when carrying the most severe wounds. 



" The average number in a troop ranged from a dozen to fifty, 

 although occasionally eighty or a hundred might be seen together. 

 The cows generally calve from September to the end of November. 



" The flesh of the hartebeest, although dark in colour, is fairly good, 

 although not comparable to that of springbok, eland, or klipspringer. It 

 is used a good deal as biiltong, and in that form (cut into strips, slightly 

 salted and sun-dried) is very palatable ; and hartebeest-stew is by no 

 means bad." 



THE LELWEL HARTEBEEST 



(Bubcdis lelwet) 



Tit el, SUDANI ; Mangazi, WAG AN DA 

 (PLATE iv, fig. 8) 



Having the same long face as the Cape species, this hartebeest 

 is distinguished by the taller horn-pedicle, the somewhat less abrupt 

 backward bending of the horns, and the lighter and redder colour. 

 The typical race (Bitbalis lelwel typica) inhabits the Bahr-el-Ghazal, 

 Upper Nubia, and Kordofan, and has a dark face-blaze, which is wanting 

 in the other races. Of the latter, the White Nile race (B. 1. niedeckf] 

 differs from the one mentioned next by the tips of the horns being parallel 

 or inclining slightly inwards. It inhabits the eastern Sudan, on the 

 White Nile. The Baringo, or Jackson's, race (/>. /. jacksoni), from the 

 interior of British Central Africa and the district north of Lake Baringo, 



