39 
Hab. South Africa, south of the Limpopo River, but extending further north 
along the edge of the Kalahari Desert. Now nearly extinct in the Cape 
Colony; still found in the Transvaal. 
The Hartebeest was well known to Sparrmann and other travellers in the 
Cape Colony at the close of the last century. It was figured by Buffon in 
one of the supplementary volumes to his ‘ Histoire Naturelle’ as the ‘‘Caama 
ou Bubale,” but was generally confounded by systematists with the Bubal of 
North Africa, until Georges Cuvier, in 1816, gave it the name of Antilope 
caama—< Caama” or “ Khama” being the term applied to it by the Bechuanas. 
In the days of Sparrmann the Hartebeest was very abundant all over the Cape 
Colony, and was found in large troops even in the immediate vicinity of 
Cape Town. 
In 1811, when Burchell visited South Africa, the Hartebeest appears to 
have become already much less abundant; but Burchell speaks of having 
met with it on the Gariep or Orange River and in other localities. 
‘Twenty-five years later, when Harris made his celebrated sporting excursions 
into South Africa, the Hartebeest had retreated still further into the interior. 
But Harris speaks of it as being at that date still met with on the plains 
beyond the Orange River “in immense herds.” Sir Andrew Smith, who 
visited the Cape Colonies at about the same epoch, and who has figured the 
male of this Antelope in his well-known ‘Illustrations of the Zoology of 
South Africa,’ speaks of the occurrence of the Hartebeest far in the interior. 
He killed specimens himself close to the Tropic of Capricorn, and had heard 
of its occurrence much further northwards. But, according to his observa- 
tions, Bubalis caama begins to get rare as soon as the Sassaby (Damaliscus 
lunatus) commences to occur. His experience justified him in pronouncing 
that the former took the place of the latter in all the territory northward of 
25° south latitude. Sir Andrew Smith gives the following account of the 
habits of the Hartebeest :— 
“The Hartebeest, by preference, inhabits an open country, and hence is 
generally observed upon the plains in small herds consisting of from six to 
ten individuals, and often, where the plains are extensive, many of such groups 
are to be seen within the range of the eye. It is a very wary animal, and 
views with strong suspicion the advance of man, so that, unless favoured by 
special circumstances, he finds it an animal difficult to procure. When 
disturbed, the herd generally scampers off in the train of some acknowledged 
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