208 THE WILDERNESS AND JUNGLE 



suggest wild oxen out of drawing, and their 

 habits are as strange as their appearance. 

 Troops of them come prancing and curveting 

 about trek waggons and caravans in a manner 

 that would alarm anyone unaccustomed to 

 their ways, as there is something ferocious in 

 the aspect of their bristling faces and thick 

 manes, while their comic appearance is en- 

 hanced by the bushy tail and slender legs. 

 As a matter of fact, though less formidable 

 than they appear, these animals are anything 

 but sweet-tempered in captivity, and their 

 keepers in menageries generally learn to treat 

 them with distant respect. 



That antelopes, as, in fact, most wild game, 

 rely for protection on scent rather than on 

 either eyesight or hearing is generally recog- 

 nised, though the theory is accepted by the 

 majority of sportsmen that animals living on 

 the open plains depend on their sight more 

 than those inhabiting jungle, where they would 

 be warned of the enemy's approach by getting 

 wind of him or by hearing the crackle of the 

 undergrowth. That even creatures in the 

 open, however, smell the enemy rather than 

 see it is strikingly demonstrated by a very 

 interesting episode recently communicated to 

 The Field by Mr. Reginald Sharpe. 



Mr. Sharpe was watching a herd of reedbuck, 

 about twelve in number, in an open glade near 



