Local Variation in the Giraffe 83 
according to its describer, by the white lower portion of the legs and the curvature 
of the light lmes between the spots. 
The last of the five specimens forming the special subject of this article is the 
mounted female in the British Museum, represented in the coloured plate, which was 
lulled to the eastward of the north end of Lake Baringo. That lake, it may be 
observed, lies to the north-east of Lake Victoria Nyanza, or about 150 miles east of 
Mount Elgon. 
That this specimen is unlikely to be the female of the Quashengerhue form will 
be, I think, sufficiently apparent from a comparison of the figures, the differences between 
the bulls and cows of the Nubian and Kordofan races making no approach to those 
between the mounted bull and cow in the British Museum. As there is no bull 
from the Lake Baringo district available for comparison, 1 cannot say whether or no 
this race has a median frontal horn. In regard to its plan of coloration, the Baringo 
giraffe differs very widely tndeed from all the specimens with which we have been 
hitherto dealing. On a groundwork of bright yellow fawn are a number of very 
irregularly-shaped chestnut spots, with jagged outlines. On the neck they become 
somewhat less jagged and very sparse, and on the upper part of the limbs they break 
up into much simaller spots, although not quite so suddenly as in the Kordofan race. 
In the fore-limbs the spots stop just short of the knee, but in the hind-limbs they 
reach well on to the hock. Both limbs are spotted on the inside—the hind-pair less 
than the front ones. The under-parts have a few spots near the fore-legs, but are 
otherwise white. A very small white area occurs in the neighbourhood of the ear, 
but does not reach within a considerable distance of the eye. The spotting on the 
sides of the head does not extend nearly so much towards the front as in the 
Quashengerhue bull. 
In the ragged and somewhat star-like form of its spots this giraffe approximates to 
the description of G. camelopardalis tippelskirchi from German Hast Africa between 
Ujyji and Lakes Tanganyika and Nyassa. That form was described on the evidence 
of two specimens, in one of which the lower part of the legs was spotted, while in the 
other 1t was white, and it may be that these are really distinct. However this may be, 
it would be very rash to identify the Lake Barimgo female with a race from a district so 
far to the south as Ujiji without further evidence, more especially as we do not yet 
know the characteristics of the male. It would be still more rash to assign a distinct 
name to the specimen in question. For the present, therefore, it may remain unnamed. 
Finally, I have to mention a male giraffe from the Congo Free State mounted in the 
museum at Tervueren, near Brussels, of which the Secretary of the Interior has been good 
enough to send me a photograph, from which Fig. 6 was drawn. From the presence 
of a well-developed frontal horn, this animal is clearly allied to the northern and 
eastern forms of the species. On the other hand, it resembles the South African race 
(G. camelopardalis capensis) in having the hind-legs spotted mght down to the hoofs; 
the fore-lmbs also displaymg the same feature, although less distinctly. The sides of 
the head are much more fully spotted than in the Cape form, and the tail is remarkable 
for the great fullness of its terminal tuft. In the spotting of the legs it resembles 
the description of one of the type specimens of G. camelopardalis tippelskirchi, although 
the dark markings show no trace of the ragged and star-like form characteristic of 
that race. As to the possibility of the Congo giraffe being identical with the imperfectly 
known G. camelopardalis peralta of Nigeria, it may be remarked that the latter takes 
its name from the great length of the cannon-bones of the legs, which indicate a very 
tall animal. The Congo specimen, on the other hand, although apparently adult, is a 
comparatively small animal. It seems to me, therefore, that it imdicates a distinct race, 
for which the name G. camelopardalis congoensis will be appropriate. This race will 
