94 BEASTS AND MEN 
Boers and negroes in the neighbourhood. This device is, I 
think, sufficiently interesting to be worth recording. The pre- 
liminary operations are similar to those by which the Mongolian 
wild horses are captured. When a herd of elands has been 
found, about thirty mounted hunters surround them, and, steal- 
ing cautiously up, suddenly burst upon them from all sides. It 
would be a hopeless task to try to catch the adults, for an eland 
bull weighs over a ton and is much more powerful and fleet 
than any horse. They break into a furious gallop and soon 
vanish out of sight. But the young, with their ungainly stilt- 
like legs, are soon overtaken ; the hunter rides up to them and 
secures them by catching hold of their tails—a manceuvre 
which is often not very easy to carry out while on the gallop. 
In order that the animal may be kept alive, when caught, 
various precautions have to be taken. The hindlegs are 
tethered, and the body is carefully wrapt up in a warm rug. 
In the complete exhaustion which follows its flight for life, it 
is particularly necessary to guard it from the dangerous effects 
of a change of temperature. But another precaution has to 
be taken, much more remarkable. When the eland is com- 
fortably wrapt up in the rug it receives a subcutaneous in- 
jection of some liquid the constitution of which my travellers 
have unfortunately not been able to discover. Probably it is 
morphia or something of the sort, for a few minutes after the 
injection a stupefied condition supervenes and the antelope 
quickly falls into a deep sleep. Without this injection the 
creature would scarcely live a quarter of an hour; before 
this method of treating them was hit upon, they used to die 
from heart strain. When it has gone to sleep, it is carried 
back to the camp and laid in a secluded place, where it re- 
mains in a deep sleep for nearly twenty-four hours. On its 
awakening it is led to a milch-cow which has been previously 
secured, and it is trained to regard the cow as its foster- 
mother. The cow's legs have first to be tied, for she soon real- 
ises that it is not her own calf but a new arrival from the veldt. 
After a few days the foster-parent and child come to know 
