HUNTING THE GAZELLE 



Colonel Roosevelt Secures a Thompson Gazelle for the National Museum — Many Varieties 

 of the Gazelle Family — East Africa's Most Graceful Animal. 



Riding along the vast plains around Sir Alfred Pease's ranch Mr. Roose- 

 velt and his companions saw herds of hartebeest and troops of the smaller 

 varieties of the gazelle family, but the absence of trees made stalking very 

 difficult, and the shy denizens of the velt gradually succeeded in getting away 

 before our hunters could get within shooting distance. 



Mr. Roosevelt was especially anxious to kill one of the beautiful Grant's 

 gazelles for the National Museum in Washington, but this wary and light- 

 footed animal eluded all his attempts and after several hours' exhausting pur- 

 suit he had to give it up for the time being. But he succeeded in shooting a 

 Thompson gazelle, a smaller variety of the great antelope family. 



The two kinds of gazelles most frequently seen by the American hunting 

 expedition in East Africa were the Thompson gazelle and the Grant gazelle. 

 The latter one is a beautiful large animal and was discovered in i860 by 

 Grant in the vicinity of the Victoria Nyanza, while the smaller variety killed 

 by Mr. Roosevelt was not known to European naturalists until the English 

 traveler, Thompson, found it twenty-five years ago-. 



The stately male Grant gazelle is adorned with long and beautifully bent 

 horns, those of the female also being long but not quite so heavy. This species 

 is spread all over British East Africa and runs in herds of many animals. 

 The herds are in general separated according tO' sex ; the female herds, how- 

 ever, mostly being accompanied by one or more bucks. The Grant gazelle 

 inhabits the open plains, avoiding the thick forests, but frequents localities 

 thinly covered with bushes. It feeds not only on grass, but also on leaves 

 and fruits. 



While the Grant gazelle is very shy and cautious still it is not entirely safe 

 to pursue it too incautiously. The hunter may come dangerously near to 

 being impaled on its pointed horns. A famous naturalist narrowly escaped 

 this fate a short time ago. Resting in the neighborhood of the Meru moun- 

 tain he suddenly saw, in the distance, a single gazelle. He stalked it. and 

 fired at it, at a distance of about nine-hundred feet, but only wounded the ani- 

 mal. He was greatly astonished when he saw it running towards him instead 

 of from him as he had expected. He fortunately succeeded in killing the en- 

 raged animal by a second shot. 



The smaller variety known as the Thompson gazelle, which was killed by 



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