1894.] GAME-ANIMALS OF SOMALILAND. 321 



thirty followers ; in fact for many days -we had no other food ; 

 and this was no hardship whatever, as the meat is better than that 

 of many of the antelopes. The flesh is highly prized by the Eer 

 Amaden and Malingur tribes. 



The Zebra was very common in the territory of these two tribes. 

 The country there is covered with scattered bush over its entire 

 surface, and is stony and much broken up by ravines ; the general 

 elevation is about 2500 feet above sea-level. 



The Zebras, of which I saw probably not more than 200 in all, 

 were met with in small droves of about half a dozen, on low 

 plateaux covered with scattered thorn bush and glades of " durr " 

 grass, the soil being powdery and red in colour ^vith an occasional 

 outcrop of rocks. In this sort of countr}^ they are very easy to 

 stalk, and I should never have fired at them for sport alone. I 

 saw none in the open flats of the Webbe valley, and they never 

 come near so far north as the open grass-plains of the Hand, 

 Durhi south of the Fafan being their northern limit. 



The young Zebras have longer hair and the stripes are rather 

 light browQ, turning to a deep chocolate, which is nearly black in 

 adult animals. 



After firing at one of a drove of Zebras I was sorry to find on 

 going up to it that it was a female, and that its foal was standing 

 by the body, refusing to run away though the rest had all gone. 

 We crept up to within ten yards of it, and made an unsuccessful 

 attempt to noose it with a rope weighted by bullets, but it made 

 oii after the first try. We must have been quite five minutes 

 standing within ten yards in the thick bush w^hile we were pre- 

 paring the noose. 



Zebras are very inquisitive ; when I was encamped for some 

 days at Eil-Fiid, in the E.er Amaden country, the Zebras used to 

 come at night and bray and stamp round our camp, and were 

 answered by my Abyssinian mule. The sounds of the two 

 animals are very similar. 



Black Ehinooebos {Rhinoceros bicornis). Native name 

 " Whjil" 



For many years the Two-horned Rhinoceros has been known 

 to exist in the interior of Somaliland, and going further in 

 every year I have constantly been expecting to come upon their 

 ground. 



The first Somali Ehinoceroses were shot by my brother and 

 myself in oui- expedition to the Abyssinian Border in August 

 1892, and since then only a few have been shot by Europeans. 



They come far north of the range of the Zebras, sometimes 

 wandering as far as the open grass-plains of Toyo, a hundred miles 

 south of Berbera, where they hide in the patches of " durr " grass. 

 They are common in the south-eastern Hand ; I never found any 

 signs of them in many expeditions in the Habr Awat, Esa, and 

 Gadabursi countries. They are most common in the valley of the 

 Tug Fafan, and thence in the whole of the country as far as the 



