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THE STORY OF THE GAZELLE. 



African springbok. The springbok derives its name from its habit of sud- 

 denly leaping in the air; and is remarkable both for the vast numbeis in 

 which it formerly occurred, and for its periodical migrations. I was once a 

 spectator of the remarkable scene produced by one of these migrations. For 

 aboiit two hours before dawn I had been lying awake in my wagon, listening 

 to the grunting of the buck within two hundred yards of me; imagining that 



THE GOITRED GAZELLE. 



some large herd of springboks was feeding beside my camp, but, rising when 

 it was light and looking about me, I beheld the ground toi the northward of 

 my camp actually covered with a dense living mass of sprinkboks, marching 

 slowly and steadily along. They extended from an opening in a long range 

 of hills on the west, through which they continued pouring like the flood of 

 some great river, toi a ridge about a mile to the north-east, over which they 



