132 Great and Small Game of Africa 



number of such sub-families, each standing on the same platform as the 

 two latter. 



The first of such sub-family groups is constituted by the hartebeests, 

 bastard hartebeests, and gnus, and is technically known as the Bubalidina. 

 The members of this group are all more or less ungainly-looking ruminants 

 of comparatively large size, with naked muzzles, minute glands in the face 

 below the eyes, and large valved nostrils, of which the lower lids are 

 covered with a number of short bristly hairs. They have long tufted, or 

 hairy tails, and large lateral hoofs. There are no tufts of long hair 

 on the knees, and the teats of the female may be either two or four. 

 From the presence of horns in both sexes, the comparatively large 

 size of those of the females, and the shape of those of the gnus, it might be 

 inferred that the antelopes of this group are near relatives of the oxen. 

 This, however, is negatived by the conformation of their cheek-teeth, 

 which in the upper jaw have tall and very narrow crowns, more like those 

 of the sheep and goats. The skull has shallow pits below the eyes for the 

 face-glands, but no unossified spaces in this region, and no depressions on 

 the forehead. With the exception that one of the species of hartebeest 

 ranges from North Africa into Arabia, the entire group is restricted to 

 Africa. 



From the other two genera the true hartebeests are distinguished by 

 their peculiarly elongated and melancholy-looking faces, maneless necks, 

 doubly-curved horns, which are more or less suddenly bent back about the 

 middle of their length, and heavily ringed, and the undue height of the 

 withers and the lowness of the hind-quarters. They have the muzzle 

 moderately broad, the nostrils close together and lined with stiff bristles, 

 small hoofs, and the tail, which reaches below the hocks, moderately 

 haired and generally with a thin crest of longer hairs along the upper 

 surface of the terminal half. The udder of the female has but two teats. 

 In colour hartebeests may be either uniformly brown or rufous, or similarly 



