10 
of game in North Africa.” But he does not think that it ‘ ever ventures north 
of the Wed Whir and M’zab districts, while its home is certainly further south. 
It is considered to be the most savoury meat of the desert-epicure.” During 
his extensive explorations in the Great Sahara Canon Tristram saw this 
Antelope only on one occasion: this was at a distance, in the south of the 
Djereed of Tunis. 
From the Algerian Sahara the Bubal extends no doubt into Morocco on 
one side and Tripoli on the other; but our knowledge of the animals of both 
these countries is still very meagre, and we are unable to quote precise 
authorities. In Egypt,so far as we know, the Bubal appears to be now quite 
extinct, but on the other side of the Red Sea it reappears in Arabia and 
extends even up to the confines of Palestine. Canon Jristram never saw it 
alive in Palestine ; ‘ but it certainly exists on the borders of Gilead and Moab,” 
and is well known to the Arabs, who assured him that ‘‘it sometimes comes 
down to drink at the head-waters of the streams flowing into the Dead Sea, 
where they not unfrequently capture it.” Canon Tristram has kindly allowed 
one of us to examine a pair of horns obtained from the Arabs in this locality, 
which are apparently referable to a female of this species. 
The Bubal has been long introduced to the zoological gardens of Europe, 
and its name occurs in the MS. Catalogues of the Zoological Society as early 
as 1832. It bred in the Derby Menagerie, and the young one was figured in 
the drawings illustrative of that splendid collection (pl. xx.). It is not, 
however, very common in captivity, and of late years but few specimens 
have been received. At the present time there is only a single example of 
this Antelope in the Zoological Society’s collection. It is a female, presented 
by Mr. Robert Pitcairn, of Oran, in October 1883, and obtained, no doubt, in 
the interior of Western Algeria. Mr. Smit’s illustration (Plate I.) was 
prepared from this specimen. 
The series of specimens of this Antelope in the British Museum is not by 
any means a full one. There are an adult male (stuffed) and an adult female 
(in skin) from the Zoological Society’s old collection, and a young one obtained 
by Fraser in the Djereed of Tunis in 1846, besides some pairs of horns and 
frontlets. Fresh examples of this species from definite localities would 
therefore be highly valued by the Trustees. 
May, 1894. 
