“ The Eland frequents the open prairies and low rocky hills interspersed with clumps of wood, hut is never 
to be met with in a continuously wooded country. Rejoicing especially in low belts of shaded hillocks, and in 
the isolated groves of Acacia capensis which, like islands in the ocean, are scattered over many of the stony 
and gravelly plains of the interior; large herds of them are also to be seen grazing, like droves of oxen, on the 
more verdant meadows, through which some silver rivulet winds in rainbow brightness betwixt fringes of 
sighing bulrushes. Fat and lethargic, groups may be seen scattered up and down the gentle acclivities, some 
grazing on the hill side, and others lazily basking in the morning sun-beam. Advancing, they appear to move 
like a regiment of cavalry in single files, the goodliest bulls leading the van; whereas during a retreat, these 
it is, that uniformly bring up the rear. As the day dawns over the boundless meads, spread with a rich carpet 
of luxuriant herbage, and enamelled with pastures of brilliant flowers, vast droves of these lordly animals are 
constantly to be seen moving in solemn procession across the profile of the silent and treeless landscape, 
portions of which are often covered with long coarse grass, which, when dry and waving its white hay-like 
stalks to the breeze, imparts to the plain the delusive and alluring appearance of ripe cornfields.” 
The limits of the geographical range of the Eland are not yet very accurately known. The Southern 
animal does not reach Western Africa, being replaced in Senegambia by a neai’ly allied species, the Derbian 
Eland (Oreas derbianus ,) described by Dr. Gray in 1857, from horns and imperfect skins procured by Mr. Whitfield 
on the river Casamanze. This splendid antelope, a figure of which has been published in the Series of Illustrations 
of the Knowsley Menagerie, generally resembles its South-African prototype, but is distinguished by its black 
neck and dorsal line, and by the wavy white stripes which descend on each side of its body. It is a little-known 
animal, which, if obtained in a living state, would be a most brilliant addition to our Menageries. 
On the Eastern coast Dr. Peters, in his “Zoology of the Mozambique,” registers the occurrence of the common 
Eland upon the faith of a pair of horns obtained from the natives to the north-west of Tete. But, farther in 
the interior, to the north of Shesheke, a different Eland certainly seems to prevail, resembling somewhat the 
Western African (Oreas derbianus) in its striped body, but differing in the absence of black upon the neck, and 
other particulars. Of this animal examples have not as yet reached the Museums of Europe, and our only 
information concerning it is derived from Dr. Livingstone, who has described and figured it* in his notes as a 
new or striped variety of the Eland. Let us hope that Dr. Livingstone’s present expedition will not neglect to 
bring us home more accurate intelligence concerning this interesting animal. 
The accompanying plate represents a young male, about fifteen months old, of the Common Eland, and 
its mother in the back-ground. 
Livingstone’s “Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa,” p. 210. 
