76 ANIMAL LIFE IN AFRICA 



than is the custom of the gemsbuck, and are sometimes 

 found in herds of as many as fifty. 



THE WHITE ORYX is found to the west of the Nile, 

 and thence across the continent nearly to the west coast. 

 It is an essentially desert animal, and, like the gemsbuck, 

 apparently associates in small parties. 



THE ADDAX. The addax is distantly related to both 

 the oryxes and the roan and sable antelopes. It stands 

 about forty-two inches at the shoulder, and is of a pale 

 sandy colour, admirably matching the desert wastes in 

 which it lives. An inhabitant of northern Africa, it 

 extends into the Ethiopian region as far as seven or eight 

 degrees north of the Equator, and, living far away amid 

 the waterless sandy desert, is therefore extremely difficult 

 for the European to reach, and so very few have been 

 killed by white hunters. 



CHAPTER X 

 ANTELOPES (continued) 

 Hartebeests and their Kin : Wildebeests 



THE HARTEBEEST. Hartebeests present everywhere the 

 same general characteristics. They are large ungainly 

 looking creatures, with long " fiddle " faces ; they 

 seem to labour in their gallop, and it is only when 

 there is some means of practically testing their speed 

 that it is realized at what a tremendous pace they can 

 actually move. They are naturally rather inquisitive 

 and stupid, being therefore easy animals to shoot when 

 unused to being much disturbed. They are found either 

 in open forest country or in treeless plains. Just as^in 

 past days the Cape hartebeest crowded the high veld of 



