78 EXPEDITION INTO [Chap. X. 



Acrouotine group, and are alike remarkable for their 

 elevated withers, drooping hind quarters, and tri- 

 angular form. The colour of the former is purple 

 violet, and of the latter bright orange ; their legs 

 and faces being eccentrically marked, as if with the 

 brush of a sign painter ; and their horns placed on 

 the very summit of the head, upon a prolongation 

 of the frontal bone, instead of above the eyes as in 

 most other antelopes. Their brain, as well as that 

 of the gnoo, is filled with large white maggots — 

 a phenomenon, of which, until I had received ocular 

 evidence, I could not help being sceptical. 



Rations of flour were here first served out to the 

 followers, in the measure of three-quarters of a 

 pound of meal to each man, and were continued 

 daily during the rest of the journey. In the morn- 

 ing four savages vokmteered to show us a rhinoce- 

 ros. We accompanied them amongst ruined stone 

 kraals of great extent, situated to the left of the 

 road, and so overgrown with thorn-bushes, that we 

 were not unfrequently obliged to exchange an erect 

 for a stooping posture, and at times even to travel 

 on our hands and knees. We found nothing, how- 

 ever, but a pack of wild dogs* that had just hunted 

 down a hartebeest. Like the wild dogs of India, 

 these animals take the field in organized packs, and 

 by their perseverance seldom fail to weary out the 

 swiftest antelope. Of a slender form, the general 

 colour is ochreous yellow, blotched and brindled 

 with dingy black. The ears are large and semi- 



* Hytena renalka. 



