278 Great and Small Game of Africa 



It must be on the Incus a non lucendo principle that it is known as a 

 waterbuck, for it is found only in hilly and, as a rule, stony country. The 

 upper slopes or flat crests of stony ridges are quite the most likely ground 

 whereon to find it, though there it must rather be looked for in the pre- 

 cipitous gullies and nullahs which cut up the surface. When met with 

 on the lower slopes it will invariably head uphill, and dash across the 

 roughest boulders with amazing fearlessness and sureness of foot. The 

 only time I have heard of them by water in any number was up the river 

 Benue, well towards Yola, when an officer of the Royal Niger Constabulary, 

 steaming up-stream, saw a herd of a dozen swimming across the river, which 

 at that place was about three-quarters of a mile in width. He and an 

 executive officer with whom he was travelling got into a ship's boat with 

 some "boys" and paddled after them, coming up with them easily enough, 

 and even succeeding in getting fair hold of the horns of a couple of bulls. 

 But their strength was prodigious, and there was no holding them when 

 they gained foothold at the bank, and the herd got clean away in spite of 

 a couple of hasty shots at a range of 10 yards as they topped the bank 

 above the boat. As a rule the sing-sing goes about in families, though 

 occasionally, as in the above case, two or three families may be seen 

 together. The young, which are dropped about Christmas, appear to 

 remain with their parents for a much longer period than do the young of 

 other antelope on the west coast, in fact almost until they arrive at maturity. 

 It is also a curious fact that I have never seen a single young one, each 

 pair of bull and female appearing with a couple of youngsters whenever 

 I have come across a family ; but I will not be certain that there has not 

 been another cow in the immediate vicinity. With young about, the 

 female is very wary and suspicious, and is ever on the watch, taking her 

 food a mouthful at a time, and then standing watching carefully in every 

 direction, or patrolling in a circle around the corner in which her young 

 are feeding and gambolling. The sing-sing being a comparatively slow 



