274 ANTELOPES 



southern one, with the neck relatively longer, the colour less rufous, 

 a difference in the form of the white markings on the tail, and finer 

 horns. It also lacks the black knee-tufts found in the typical race. 

 Mr. Rothschild observes (in Powell-Cotton's Abyssinia) that although 

 the Somali " gerenuk has been treated as a distinct species both by its 

 describer and Messrs. Sclater and Thomas, I feel sure it is more 

 reasonable to regard it only as a northern race or subspecies, and have 

 therefore recorded it trinomially." 



The following excellent description of the Somali race is abbreviated 

 from one furnished by Mr. D. G. Elliot : 



" Waller's gazelle has a very long neck, large eyes, lengthened 

 muzzle, with depressed nostrils and upper lips, and a general shape 

 of face not unlike that of a giraffe. The skull is very wide between 

 the eyes, and rapidly contracts to the nose, causing the head to appear, 

 when viewed from the front, in shape like a wedge. The body, which 

 is moderately long and narrow, is mounted upon long, very slender legs, 

 and terminates in a short, slender, most insignificant tail. The hind 

 part of the skull is greatly extended, so that the horns are nearly 

 midway between the tip of the nose and the back of the head. In 

 front of the eyes, filling up the orbital vacuity, is a conspicuous 

 prominence with a central aperture, from which exudes a black 

 secretion that stains everything it touches, in the same way that ink 

 does. Neither the skin, when removed from the animal, nor the skull, 

 affords any idea of the size of this singular prominence in fact, there 

 is a cavity in the skull where it is situated ; and artists who have 

 attempted to reproduce this species either in a drawing or by a model 

 have failed entirely to present the animal as it appears in life. The 

 skin in front of the eye has usually been laid perfectly flat, and 

 coloured white. The only other animals that I have met with which 

 possess this prominence are the dik-diks, and these, as regards their 

 respective size, have it to an even larger extent than Waller's gazelle." 



Since this was written a head has been placed on exhibition in the 

 British Museum (Natural History) showing the true form and colour of 

 the swollen area round the eye, which is doubtless of a glandular nature. 



" The gerenuk," continues Mr. Elliot, " is not a graceful animal, as 

 may be imagined, either in figure or in its movements. It walks along 

 in a slouching kind of way, as though it were loose about the joints, 

 and when startled drops its head below the bushes and on a line with 

 its body and sneaks away in a very different manner from the gallant 

 bounding spring with which its relative the dibatag removes itself from 

 the object of its fears. It goes usually in small troops of from three 



