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creating a new gencric name, which has ever since been universally employed 
for the Kudu. Although many authorities are of opinion that the adoption 
of a specific name for the genus ought not to interfere with its usage for the 
species also, and consequently that the present animal ought to be called 
Strepsiceros strepsiceros, such has not been our custom in the present work, 
and it is consequently necessary to search out the second given specific name. 
For this there may be said to be two generally recognized claimants—first, 
‘‘ capensis,” bestowed upon it by Dr. Andrew Smith in 1834; and, secondly, 
“kudu,” applied to it by Gray in 1843. Of these we are inclined to adopt 
the former as first given, although the latter has been more generally 
accepted. 
It is true no doubt that so long ago as 1816, in his ‘ Lehrbuch der 
Zoologie,’ Oken introduced the Kudu into his list of the species of the genus 
“Cemas” under the heading “C. kuhdu, Strepsiceros, Cervus capensis.” 
But it does not seem to be quite certain that Oken hereby intended to bestow 
on the Kudu a new specific name, and under these circumstances it would 
be objectionable, we think, to call the Kudu, Strepsiceros kuhdu (Oken). It 
has therefore been decided to employ Andrew Smith’s name, concerning 
which there can be no doubt whatever, for the present Antelope, and to 
designate it Strepsiceros capensis. 
The well-known travellers Sparrman (1785), Thunberg (1795), Daniell 
(1804), Burchell (1822), and Steedman (1835), all met with the Kudu during 
their journeyings in different parts of the Cape Colony, in the more remote 
parts of which it was still plentiful in their days. Harris (1836-37) states 
that although at that period the Kudu was still found in many of the more 
retired portions of the Colony, he did not himself meet with it until he had 
entered the “prolific environs” of the Cashaan Mountains of Pretoria. 
Harris claims for the Kudu the “right and title to the sovereignty of all the 
Antelopes.” Other species of this group, he allows, may be “ stately, elegant, 
or curious,” but the Kudu is “absolutely regal.” | 
Harris, in the letterpress to his ‘ Portraits,’ describes the habits of the 
Kudu in the Cashaan Mountains in the following lively manner :— 
“There in the depths of solitary woods, by human foot untrod, the noble animal 
occurs in such every-day abundance, that many a gory trophy was realized; but his 
great sagacity, wildness, and self-possession, demanding the most skilful generalship to 
out-manzuvre him, the pursuit necessarily differs altogether from the usual stamp of 
