3!S 



POPULAR OFFICIAL GUIDE. 



NUBIAN GIRAFFES. 



The Eland, (Taurotragus oryx), is the largest and most 

 imposing of all antelopes. As might be inferred from its 

 great size, it is now so nearly extinct that it has almost dis- 

 appeared from the lists of dealers in wild animals. The 

 fine young pair now in the Antelope House was presented by 

 the Duke of Bedford, from his famous animal collection at 

 Woburn Park. The fully adult female is the gift of Mr. C. 

 Ledyard Blair. 



Of Elands there are two well-marked species. That of 

 eastern and southern Africa, here represented, was once 

 numerous on many of the fertile plains of the great plateau 

 now known as Rhodesia, and in fact throughout nearly the 

 whole of the uplands of eastern Africa, from the Cape to 

 the Sahara. Unfortunately, however, white hunters and 

 modern firearms have reduced the countless thousands of 

 the great herds to numbers so small that the capture and 

 expoi'tation of Elands have practically ceased. 



Although a number of Elands have been born in cap- 

 tivity, the number on public exhibition still Remain very 

 small. The only captive herd known to the writer is that 

 of the Duke of Bedford, in Woburn Park, England, which 

 is at once the admiration and envy of all collectors of living 

 wild animals. 



The White- Tailed Gnu, (Connochaetes gnu), once was 

 abundant in South Africa, south of the Vaal River. But it 

 has shared the fate of all the other large mammals of that 



