founded upon it, and more formally proposed by Pallas under the 

 name of Antilope. 



llie works of Pallas, Pennant, AUaman, Gmelin, Erxleben, .Shaw, 

 Illiger, Lichtenstein, De Blainville, and Col. Hamilton Smith, next 

 paiBS under the notice of the author. 



The consideration of the muzzle and lachrymal sinus was first 

 introduced by Illiger, and his principles were quickly adopted, in 

 successive monographs by Lichtenstein, De Blainville, and Hamilton 

 Smith, to subdivide the Antelopes into something more nearly ap- 

 proaching natural groups than the old principles admitted, ITic 

 publication of Illiger's ' Prodromus' may be considered therefore as 

 an epoch in the history of these animals. 



The monograph of Dr. Lichtenstein contains descriptions of 

 twenty-nine species, and these are distributed into four groups, cha- 

 racterized by the presence or absence of horns in the females, and of 

 lachrymal sinuses, the existence or non-existence of dewlap, and the 

 comparative length of the tail. But the author was in many ca-ses 

 ignorant of the specific characters of the animals, and the compo- 

 sition of his groups is consequently fault}- in proportion. The di- 

 visions, however, are exceedingly well imagined, and less encumbered 

 with trivial characters than those of De Blainville and Hamilton 

 Smith. 



M. De Blainville, whose monograph of the genus Antilope was 

 published in 1816, contented himself with separating from the main 

 group successive detachments of what he conceives to be the most 

 anomalous species, afterwards elaborating the characters of the sub- 

 genera thus formed from those of their component species. By this 

 means he has unquestionably succeeded in forming a few natural 

 groups, to which no other objection can be made than that they are 

 considered as subdivisions of a primarj' group which is not itself a 

 natural genus. 



To the eight genera established by De Blainville, Desmarest ad- 

 ded three others, two of which, viz. the separation of the Antelopes 

 proper from the Koodoo and Boshbok, and of the Oryxes, were de- 

 cided improvements. 



The princi]jal merit of Col. Hamilton Smith's monograph, pub- 

 lished in Griffith's tran-slation of the ' Regne Animal,' consists in the 

 resolution of the residual group of De Blainville and Desmarest, 

 which he subdivides into eight minor groups, in aU respects more 

 definite and natural than the original. 



The next section of the paper is devoted to the consideration of 

 the characters hitherto employed in the generic distribution of these 

 animals. 



The genera Bos, Ovis, and Capra, represented by familiar and 

 well-known types, observes Mr. Ogilby, carried with them clear 

 and definite ideas, and represented to the mind of the naturalist di- 

 stinct and determined forms, but the genus Antilope not being ex- 

 emplified by any common domestic species familiar to the observa- 

 tion of the student, every thing connected with the genus was vague 

 and indeterminate ; the only conception it enabled him to form was. 



