756 The American Naturalist. [September, 
kings ; and, since all the hartebeests can be readily domesticated when 
caught young, we conclude that in the days of the Pharoahs they act- 
- ually broke in the hartebeests as beasts of draught. The Dutch name 
implies stag-ox, so that the old settlers may have done the same, unless 
the Zulus brought the Arabic name down with them, and it was then 
translated by the Boers into equivalent Dutch. 
The Caama or true South African hartebeest is, as Cornwallis Harris 
remarks, made of triangles. The male stands five feet at the withers, 
and nine in extreme length. The crupper is drooping and the shoulder 
elevated ; the head heavy, narrow, long. The horns are seated on the 
summit of a beetling ridge of bone on the forehead, almost touching at 
the base, thick, diverging and again approaching, turned forewards and 
then acutely backwards, with points directed horizontally to the rear. 
The surface of the horns is embossed with five or six prominent knots 
on the front only. The neck and throat are bare, with no mane. The 
coat is short and glossy ; color, bright orange-sienna with a crimson 
cast. There is a black patch at the base of the horns above the fore- 
head, continued behind, and terminating in front of the ear. A black 
streak down the nose, and a black stripe down the ridge of the neck. 
Chin black. A black line down the front of each leg, terminating in 
an angular band above the fetlock. Tail reaching to the hocks, with 
backwardly directed glossy black hair. Legs slender with taper hoofs. 
Ears whitish, long, pointed and flexible. A half-muzzle dividing the 
nostrils; nose flattened, moist. Eyes high in the head, wild, and of a 
fiery-red color. Female with more slender horns, and fainter in color. 
Two mammæ. Young born singly in April and September. 
The hartebeest is found in small flocks, headed by three or four 
stout males, the weaker being expelled and forced to establish a com- 
munity of their own. In fighting they drop down on their knees, and, 
placing their forehead parallel with the ground by putting their nose 
between their legs, butt each other with intense fury, their gnarled and 
angular horns interlocking, and inflicting gaping, jagged wounds. A 
common habit is to rake their horns against the trees until they are cov- 
ered with bark. 
In running the caama has long, oily, and beautiful paces, which are 
of the most approved racing style. Moving at a smooth and swinging 
canter, throwing its hind quarters well under the body, brandishing the 
glossy tail, and carrying its great beamy head in the best possible 
manner, it cuts a very majestic appearance, notwithstanding its angu- 
lar build. So swift of flight is it that the hunter is again and again 
disappointed when trying to chase it on horseback; but in and around 
