62 THE QUAGGA. 



describes the quagga as existing in immense lierds in tlie 

 Oape Colony in tlie open and level lowlands ; and, writing 

 some seventy years since, Thomas Pringle, the well-known 

 poet of South Africa, who was intimately acquainted with 

 the large animals of the Cape Colony, described the quagga 

 as then abundant in the Great Karroo. In his poem, " Afar 

 in the Desert," he writes : 



Afar in the desert I love to ride, 



With the silent bushboy alone by my side ; 



O'er the.brovrn Karroo,, where the bleating cry 



Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively, 



And the timorous quagga's shriU whisthng neigh, • 



Is heard by the fountain at twilight grey, 



Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane, 



With wild hoof scouring the desolate plain. 



And in a note he says : " The cry of the quagga (proitounced 

 quagha or quacha) is very different from that of either 

 the horse or ass, and I have endeavoured to express its 

 peculiar character in the above line ; " in another note to 

 the same poem he says : " The zebra is commonly termed 

 Ivilde-paard, or wild horse, by the Dutch African colonists; 

 This animal is now scarce within the colony, but is still 

 found in considerable herds in the northern wastes and 

 mountains inhabited by the Bushmen." 



■ The geographical range of the quagga appears to have' 

 been much more restricted than that of the other species. 

 Mr. H. Bryden, in his interesting work entitled " Kloof and 

 Karroo," which may be rightly described as an admirable 

 account of the sports, legends, and natural history of the- 

 Cape Colony, writes as follows : 



"The range of the true quagga was even more arbitrarily 

 defined. This animal, formerly so abundant upon the fai' 

 spreading kaiTOos of the Cape Colony and the plains of the 



