126 ON SAFARI 



Thomson's gazelle, choosiug the best heads I could see 

 among hundreds. None of the horns, however, exceeded 

 13|- ins. in length. These are exc[uisitely graceful 

 little antelopes, scarcely so large as a roe-deer ; it was a 

 lovely spectacle to watch them playfully coursing each 

 other in sheer exuberance of spirits, the pursued dodging 

 and doubling with the speed and resource of a hare 

 before greyhounds. They are confiding little beasties, 

 and can often be approached, by circling around them, 

 within a range of 100 to 120 yards; but even then 

 present but a small mark for a rifle, since, diminutive 

 as they are, they possess the same tenacity of life 

 that characterises their larger congeners, and, unless 

 struck well forward, will carry on for miles though 

 practically disembowelled. Their irides are very dark 

 hazel, and bucks that we weighed scaled from 48 

 to 57 lbs. 



On approaching the north-west end of the lake, we 

 found that between the higher plateau we had been tra- 

 versing and the actual shores was interposed a lower-lying 

 plain a mile or two in width. The dividing escarpment 

 at this point was abrupt, dropping to the plain below in 

 rugged crags of a couple of hundred feet ; and spying 

 from the ridge, we saw many troops of zebra and 

 gazelles, with a few impala dotted about. A single 

 antelope, however, at once arrested attention ; though 

 generally similar to the granti buck amidst which it 

 was, this animal stood higher on its legs, was longer in 

 neck, and moreover displayed the black lateral band 

 characteristic of G. thomsoni, but not of granti. A 

 near approach, in full face, was imjDossible ; but a shot 

 at 200 yards, though it struck too far back, appeared 

 completely to have disabled the stranger. Then it 

 recovered and went off" across the far-stretched plain 

 further than I could follow with binoculars — further, 

 indeed, than I ever remember to have seen a hard-struck 

 beast go without stopping. Elmi, all along, had asserted 

 that this was an "Aoul" (Gazella scemmeringi, the 

 common species of Somaliland), and being a Somali, and 



