SOME NATURAL HISTORY 
265 
they can lie and how effectually they can escape 
detection. 
The reedbuck has short horns, usually between 
seven and ten inches in length, but one of our party 
secured one set of horns ten and a quarter inches 
long—an exceptionally fine head. The reedbuck’s 
distinguishing characteristic is a sharp whistle, 
which he sounds shrilly when alarmed. 
Another beautiful antelope that we met in small 
numbers on the Tana River and on the Guas 
Ngihsu Plateau was the bushbuck, found in thick 
scrub along rivers and also in the swamps and wet 
places. This animal belongs to a select little coterie 
of highly prized and rare antelopes, all of which 
have the distinguishing feature of a spiral horn. 
The bushbuck is the smallest, and is found over 
nearly all of East Africa except upon the open 
plains and deserts. The females are of a dark 
chestnut color, and the males dark, almost black, 
with white markings on the neck and forelegs. A 
bushbuck with fifteen-inch horns is considered a 
fine prize, although horns of nineteen inches are on 
record. 
The other members of the same family of spiral¬ 
horned antelopes are the kudu, the lesser kudu, the 
situtunga, the nyala, the bongo, and the lordly 
eland, king of all antelopes in size. The kudu is 
largely protected in East Africa, and in my shoot¬ 
ing experience I was not in a district where he was 
to be found. The same was true with respect to the 
lesser kudu. The nyala is a South African species 
