The Springbuck 337 



shoot them mainly for their skins, which are skilfully sewn into karosses, 

 and sold in Cape Colony. They are found too here and there in Damara- 

 land, as well as upon the Ovampo Flats, and from thence sparingly up the 

 west coast to Benguela in Portuguese West Africa, where Mr. G. W. Penrice 

 has recently found them. Mr. Penrice's article, which follows the present, 

 deals with the occurrence of these antelopes in that province, the most 

 northerly part of the African continent to which their range extends. 



At the present time some of the most favourite grazing-grounds of the 

 springbuck are to be found in Ngamiland and the North Kalahari. Here 

 on the open plains of the Botletli River, and about the numerous salt-pans of 

 that region, they are still to be seen in large numbers. In this region I have 

 had plenty of opportunity of observing these graceful and sprightly creatures 

 in their truly wild state. As we trekked slowly across the grass plains and 

 by the great salt-pans we (my hunting companion and myself) usually had the 

 pleasure of seeing springbuck dotted thickly about the veld, grazing quietly 

 within 500 or 600 yards of our daily camps. During the sharp nights 

 of the period of South African winter (May, June, and July) many of these 

 animals find shelter from the cold and frost among the bushes skirting the 

 plains and fringing the salt-pans. Here, by rising before dawn and riding 

 out with the first streak of daylight, one often found them. They are, 

 like other game, exceedingly fond of these salt-pans, and in the Lower 

 Kalahari, in the neighbourhood of Morokweng, British Bechuanaland, I 

 have found them constantly frequenting the salt bracks, under cover ot 

 night, to lick the hard white limestone pans which are found here 

 and there. The edges of these salt-licks were completely hollowed out by 

 the tongues of countless antelopes, which in ages of the past had resorted 

 thither. Upon the vast salt-pans of Ngamiland, usually covered during 

 the dry season with a smooth coating of silvery-gray sand, the spring- 

 bucks were often to be found in large numbers, and at sunrise nothing 

 could be imagined more beautiful or more characteristic than the sight 



