ELEPHANTS.— NEW SPECIES OF ANTELOPE. g5 



The plants and bushes were diy ; but wild indigo abounded, as 

 indeed it does over large tracts of Africa. It is called mohetolo, 

 or the " changer," by the boys, who dye their ornaments of straw 

 with the juice. There are two kinds of cotton in the country, 

 and the Mashona, who convert it into cloth, dye it blue with this 

 plant. 



We found the elephants in prodigious numbers on the south- 

 ern bank. They come to drink by night, and after having slaked 

 their thirst — in doing which they throw large quantities of water 

 over themselves, and are heard, while enjoying the refreshment, 

 screaming with delight — they evince their horror of pitfalls by 

 setting off in a straight line to the desert, and never diverge till 

 they are eight or ten miles off. They are smaller here than in 

 the countries farther south. At the Limpopo, for instance, they 

 are upward of twelve feet high ; here, only eleven : farther north 

 we shall find them nine feet only. The koodoo, or tolo, seemed 

 smaller, too, than those we had been accustomed to see. We saw 

 specimens of the kuabaoba, or straight-horned rhinoceros {R. Os- 

 wellii), which is a variety of the white {12. simus) ; and we found 

 that, from the horn being projected downward, it did not obstruct 

 the line of vision, so that this species is able to be much more 

 wary than its neighbors. 



We discovered an entirely new species of antelope, called leche" 

 or lechwi. It is a beautiful water-antelope of a light brownish- 

 yellow color. Its horns — exactly like those of the Aigoceros 

 ellipsiprimnus, the water-buck, or tumogo, of the Bechuanas — 

 rise from the head with a slight bend backward, then curve for- 

 ward at the points. The chest, belly, and orbits are nearly 

 white, the front of the legs and ankles deep brown. From the 

 horns, along the nape to the withers, the male has a small mane 

 of the same yellowish color with the rest of the skin, and the 

 tail has a tuft of black hair. It is never found a mile from wa- 

 ter ; islets in marshes and rivers are its favorite haunts, and it is 

 quite unknown except in the central humid basin of Africa. 

 Having a good deal of curiosity, it presents a noble appearance 

 as it stands gazing, with head erect, at the approaching stranger. 

 When it resolves to decamp, it lowers its head, and lays its horns 

 down to a level with the withers ; it then begins with a waddling 

 trot, which ends in its galloping and springing over bushes like the 



