i22 THE MAMMALS OF ETHIOPIAN AFRICA 



The typical South African race of the widely ranging bonte-quagga (E. 

 burchelli typicus) comes so close to the quagga that the two have been regarded 

 as specifically inseparable. Be this as it may, the typical bonte-quagga is a rather 

 larger animal with white legs, the stripes extending well on to the hind-quarters, 

 and the orange ground between the broad, dark brown body-stripes marked by the 

 aforesaid faint shadow-stripes. This typical race is now verging on extinction, if 

 indeed it has not already ceased to exist, but the species is represented by a number 

 of local races in Central and East Africa, in which the legs are more or less fully 

 striped, while the shadow-stripes gradually disappear till, In the northern races, 

 they are completely wanting. The species presents, in fact, a curious analogy to 

 the local colour-variations in the giraffe. There is, however, this remarkable 

 difference in the two species, namely, that while in the bonte-quagga white legs are 

 distinctive of the southern races, precisely the reverse of this occurs in the case of 

 the giraffe. 



Griqualand West and the Orange River Colony were the habitat of the 

 typical race of the species. Between the watersheds of the Limpopo and the 

 Zambesi occurs the race known as E. b. chapmani, a slender-built and short-limbed 

 animal, with the legs barred to the hoofs, but the shadow-stripes still distinct. 

 Between the Orange River and the watershed of the Cunene and Coanza Rivers is 

 found the Damara race (E. b. antiquoritm), in which the legs are barred to the 

 knees and hocks and the shadow-stripes are distinct. The Mashonaland race is 

 known as E. b. selousi, and the one from Nyasaland as E. b. crawshayi. With 

 the East African E. b. boehmi, whose range includes the country between the 

 Zambesi and the first parallel of north latitude, wc come to a race in which the 

 ground-colour of the coat is white (tinged with yellow in old age), the 

 stripes are nearly black, and the legs fully barred, with the pasterns black. With 

 the Lake Rudolf country and adjacent parts of Abyssinia, we reach the domain of 

 the race differing the most widely of all from the typical southern animal, so 

 widely indeed that by some naturalists it has been regarded as a species by itself. 

 This race, E. b. granti, in which the ground-colour is pure white and free from 

 shadow-stripes, has the stripes deep black, and the legs barred right down to the 

 hoofs, with wholly black pasterns. It should be added that the foregoing list does 

 not include the whole of the races of this species, but those selected for mention 

 suffice to show the extreme range of its local variation. 



In the old days, bonte-quaggas swarmed on the open veldt of South Africa, 

 where they generally associated in large troops, and consorted with gnus and 

 ostriches. In parts of East Africa such large troops may still be seen, but 

 from the south they have long since disappeared. 



A zebra inhabiting the mountainous country opposite Teti, on the north bank 

 of the lower portion of the Zambesi valley, has been described as a distinct species, 

 under the name of E. foai. From all the races of the bonte-quagga this zebra 

 appears to be distinguished by the larger number of main stripes on the body and 

 hind-quarters, and by the circumstance that there is no backward bending, except 

 in the last one, of the body-stripes as they approach the longitudinal back-stripe, to 

 which they run nearly at right angles. In this respect Foa's zebra approximates 

 to the true zebra and the undermentioned Grevy's zebra, from both of which it 



