EQUIDE 385 
century. The name is an imitation of the shrill barking neigh of 
the animal— ouag-ga, ouag-ga,” the last syllable very much pro- 
longed. It must be remembered, however, in reading books of 
African travel that the same word is very commonly applied by 
hunters to Burchell’s Zebra. 
Of the Zebras proper, the one which was first known to Europeans, 
and was formerly considered the most common, is the True Zebra 
(£. zebra), sometimes called the Mountain Zebra. It inhabits the 
mountainous regions of the Cape Colony; but now, owing to the 
advances of civilised man into its somewhat restricted range, it has 
Fic. 161.—True or Mountain Zebra (Equus zebra). 
become very scarce, and is even, like the Quagga, threatened with 
extermination at no distant date. The second species, Burchell’s 
Zebra (£. burchelli), still roams in large herds over the plains to the 
north of the Orange River, but in yearly diminishing numbers. 
Both species are subject to considerable individual variations in 
marking, but the following are the principal characters by which 
they can be distinguished. 
£. zebra (Fig. 161) is the smaller of the two (about 4 feet high 
at the shoulders), and has longer ears, a tail more scantily clothed 
with hair, and a shorter mane. The general ground colour is white, 
and the stripes are black ; the lower part of the face is bright brown. 
With the exception of the abdomen and the inside of the thighs, the 
whole of the surface is covered with stripes, the legs having narrow 
transverse bars reaching quite to the hoofs, and the base of the tail 
25 
