DISTRIBUTION OP ANIMALS. 



585 



writers, is clearly shown by Mr. Darwin, in a passage of great interest and value : " That 

 large animals require a luxuriant vegetation, has been a general assumption, which has 

 passed from one work to another ; but I do not hesitate to say that it is completely false, 

 and that it has vitiated the reasonings of geologists on some points of great interest in the 

 ancient history of the world. The prejudice has probably been derived from India, and 

 the Indian islands, where troops of elephants, noble forests, and impenetrable jungles are 

 associated together in every one's mind. If, however, we refer to any work of travels 

 through the southern parts of Africa, we shall find allusions, in almost every page, either 

 to the desert character of the country, or to the numbers of large animals inhabiting it. 

 On the southern and south-eastern coasts there are some fine forests ; but, with these 

 exceptions, the traveller may pass for days together through open plains, covered by a 

 poor and scanty vegetation. It is difficult to convey any accurate idea of degrees of 

 comparative fertility ; but it may be safely said that the amount of vegetation supported 

 at any one time by Great Britain exceeds, perhaps even tenfold, the quantity on an equal 

 area in the interior parts of Southern Africa. The fact that bullock-waggons can travel 

 in any direction, excepting near the coast, without more than occasionally half an hour's 

 delay in cutting down bushes, gives perhaps a more definite notion of the scantiness of 

 the vegetation. Now if we look to the animals inhabiting those wide plains, we shall 

 find their numbers extraordinarily great, and their bulk immense. We must enumerate 

 the elephant, three species of rhinoceros, and probably two others, the hippopotamus, the 

 giraffe, the bos caffer (as large as a full-grown bull), and the elan (but little less), two 

 zebras, and the quaccha, two gnus, and several antelopes, even larger than these latter 

 animals. It may be supposed, that although the species are numerous, the individuals of 

 each kind are few. By the kindness of Dr. Andrew Smith, I am enabled to show that 

 the case is very different. He informs me, that in lat. 24, in one day's march with the 

 bullock-waggons, he saw, without wandering to any great distance on either side, between 



one hundred and one hundred and fifty rhi- 

 noceroses, which belonged to three species; 

 the same day he saw several herds of giraffes, 

 amounting together to nearly a hundred ; and 

 that, although no elephant was observed, yet 

 they are found in this dis- 

 trict. At the distance of a 

 little more than 

 one hour's march 

 from their place ' -'^ ^ 



