Photograph by Lord Delamere. 
APRICAN ANTELOPES IN THEIR NATIVE HAUNTS 
AN AFRICAN GAME HAUNT OF THE PAST. 
By H.C) Suous: 
i i the year 1891 I visited for the first time the neighbourhood of the lower Pungwe 
river in South-Hast Afmca. For twenty years previously I had wandered and 
hunted over vast areas of country, from the Cape Colony to far-away north of the 
Zambesi, and in that time had seen game of all kinds, from the elephants, rhinoceroses 
and buffaloes of the forest regions north of the Limpopo river to the wildebeests, 
blesbucks and springbucks of the southern plains, gradually decrease and dwindle in 
numbers to such an extent that I thought that nowhere south of the great lakes 
could there be a corner of Africa left where the wild animals had not been very much 
thinned out, either as a result of the opening up and_ settlement of the country by 
Huropeans or owing to the extensive acquisition of firearms by the native _ tribes. 
However, I was mistaken, for in the year 1891, when attempting on behalf of the 
Chartered Company to discover a route free of the tse-tse fly between Mashonaland 
and the Hast African coast, I walked into the last great natural game reserve south 
of the Zambesi, in which up to that time no Huropean sportsman had, I believe, ever 
hunted, and the fell plague of rimderpest, more potent for mischief than many legions 
of human game destroyers, had until then been equally unknown. Moreover, the natives 
living in this low-lying, fever-haunted district were few in number and almost destitute 
of firearms. Hlephants still wandered over this tract of country, often in large herds, 
as their tracks and pathways leading in all directions plainly showed. But these 
animals, whose fatal possession of ivory has made them an object of pursuit to man 
in South-Hast Africa ever since the days when the ancient Arabian traders carried gold 
and ivory to King Solomon, appeared to have mbherited a timid and restless disposition 
which, in spite of a present immunity from persecution, kept them always on the 
move. All other animals were, however, singularly tame and confiding. Great herds 
of buffaloes feeding in the reed beds along the rivers or lying in the shade of the 
scattered thorn trees allowed a near approach before taking alarm, and some of the 
old bulls which were frequently encountered either alone or in little bands of four or 
five together would scarcely take the trouble to get out of one’s way. I remember 
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