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quite black. In length they attain 15 or 16 inches, with a basal circumference 
of about 6. 
Hab. Cape Colony, south of Vaal River (now nearly extinct). 
The “ Bontebok,” or ‘“‘ Pied Goat,” of the Dutch colonists of the Cape, was 
amongst the earliest Antelopes known to science. In his first essay on the 
genus Antilope, published in 1766, Pallas described it as Antilope dorcas, 
having confounded it with the Dorcas of Ailian. But in his second essay 
upon the same group, issued in the following year, he selected for it the very 
appropriate name pygarga, by which it has been generally known ever 
since. The Bontebok and Blessbok together constitute a distinct section 
of the present genus, readily known from their congeners by their smaller 
stature and conspicuous white faces. 
Lichtenstein, in his celebrated memoir on the genus Antilope, published at 
Berlin in 1814, made Antilope pygarga the tenth species of the genus, and 
gave original particulars of it from specimens which he had himself obtained 
during his visit to South Africa. He states, however, that this animal is 
the Blessbok, and not the Bontebok, of the Cape; and there can be no doubt 
that both these names have been applied to it, though the former term is 
now by general consent restricted to the next following species, Damaliscus 
albifrons. For example, Smuts, in his ‘ Knumeratio Mammalium Capensium,’ 
gives both “ Bontebok” and “ Blessbok” as the colonial names of the present 
species. In fact these animals were never correctly discriminated till Harris 
gave figures and descriptions of them in his ‘ Portraits of the Game and 
Wild Animals of Southern Africa,’ published in 1840. 
Harris tells us that in his time the Bontebok was “ common’ 
? 
in the 
interior of the Cape Colony, and was also found in one valley near Cape 
Agulhas. On the plains lying south of the Vaal River he visited the head- 
quarters of the Bontebok, where “thousands upon thousands were seen and 
numbers were daily slain.” ‘They were frequently seen congregated on the 
salt-flats, near the stagnant pools of brackish water, licking up the crystallized 
efflorescence. 
Thirty years later a very different tale was told of the Bontebok, which 
by that date had become nearly extinct except in one isolated spot. 
Mr. E. L. Layard (P. Z. S. 1871, p. 625) gives the following account of this 
animal at that period :—“‘’The Bontebok is very nearly exterminated, and, 
M 
