The Quagga -,- 



economy of powder and lead, the innumerable legions of wild game which 

 then decorated the vast plains of their country. Amongst these myriads of 

 wild game, quaggas, which in Harris's time— 1836-37— flourished there "in 

 immense herds," held their ground in constantly decreasing numbers until 

 about the year 1873, when they seem to have become completely extinct. 

 In the Cape Colony, as I have said, they had become exterminated, even so 

 far north as Colesberg, at latest by 1870, probably nearer 1865. In the 

 Great Karroo, somewhat farther south, where once they roamed in tens of 

 thousands, they had become all but extinct by the year i860. In 1858 

 three quaggas yet remained near the Tigerberg, in the eastern part 

 of the karroo. These were seen in that year by my friend the late 

 Mr. J. B. Evans, of Riet Fontein, with whom I formerly sojourned 

 in that region. This last remaining trio must have succumbed to 

 some Dutchmen's bullets shortly after, as my friend never saw them 

 again. 



In Gordon-Cumming's early days — 1843 — q ua gg as were to be found 

 upon the plains in the north of Cape Colony and especially towards Coles- 

 berg in large numbers. At that time the Dutch colonists were with their 

 long " roers " steadily engaged in shooting down the game around them. 

 " During my stay on the flats adjoining Thebus Mountain," says Cumming, 

 " scarcely an hour elapsed at morning, noon, or eve but the distant boom- 

 ing of a Dutchman's gun saluted the ear." And so, as in the Orange Free 

 State and Transvaal at a later period, the game vanished from the face of 

 the land. 



The range of the true quagga seems always to have been peculiarly 

 circumscribed. Its habitat may be pretty clearly defined as the Cape 

 Colony, westward of the Kei River, some parts of Griqualand West, and 

 the plains of the Orange Free State. Having for many years taken much 

 interest in the history of this quadruped, I have been at great pains both at 

 home and in South Africa to get at the precise limits of its range. I 



