146 THE BUSHBUCK 



possibly, their offspring. Often only one at a 

 time is met with. They frequent the thickest 

 forest and bush, in which they lie up during the 

 day. They feed on a variety of leaves, roots, 

 and seed-vessels, and, in parts of the country 

 where they are not much disturbed, commit 

 serious depredations in the native gardens. 



Bushbuck are extremely pugnacious, and their 

 encounters during the rutting season are fought 

 with such fury and resolution as to cost the lives 

 of many of the males. My old friend the late 

 Mr. John Buchanan, C.M.G., once told me of an 

 occasion on which he surprised two male bush- 

 buck fighting in his coffee plantations. So intent 

 were they upon their own affairs that they paid 

 not the smallest attention to his approach, al- 

 though he was accompanied by one or more 

 natives. The fight raged, he assured me, for 

 more than ten minutes, at the end of which time 

 one of the combatants became stunned by a 

 heavy thrust or blow from the sharp-pointed 

 horn of his adversary, and sank to the ground, 

 whereupon the victor, uttering a triumphant bark, 

 and perceiving his human audience for the first 

 time, dashed off into the bush. The vanquished 

 animal was secured by Mr. Buchanan's natives 

 and, I believe, deposited in the zoological col- 

 lection at Zomba, where, I understand, it un- 

 fortunately died. 



In the higher and more mountainous regions 

 of Zambezia the same bushbuck as the one I have 

 described is common. In the early morning, 

 especially if the day be dull and cloudy, they may 



