BUSHBUCKS, KOODOOS, AND ELANDS 461 
to have known the common eland to do. These branches 
are broken to get at the leaves; we found them broken at a 
height of seven or eight feet, and the crack of the breaking 
was one of the sounds for which we listened as we followed 
the tracks of a herd. The stomach of one of the animals 
Kermit shot contained the leaves and pods of a small bean- 
tree, Lonchocarpus laxiflorus , and the leaves of the shea 
butter-tree, Butyrospermum parki , specimens of which were 
preserved by Kermit. 
The country in which we found the giant eland was at 
that time very dry. The flats of endless dust-colored thorn 
scrub, which hid everything at a distance of one or two 
hundred yards, were broken by occasional ranges of low, 
ragged hills. In the empty watercourses the holes were 
many miles apart. The thorn scrub was varied by occa¬ 
sional palms and patches of bamboo, and more often by 
trees with bright green leaves and large bean pods. The 
elands which we killed had been browsing on the bean pods 
and leaves of this tree, and of another less conspicuous tree. 
They had not been grazing. They drank at some pool 
before dawn, and then travelled many miles into the heart 
of the parched flats, browsing as they went. Before noon 
they halted, standing or more often lying down, in the scanty 
shade of some clump of thorn trees. By mid-afternoon 
they again moved off, feeding. They walked fast, and when 
alarmed went at a slashing trot. 
They were far more wary than the roan, hartebeest, and 
other buck found in the same locality. They were found in 
herds of from ten to thirty or forty individuals; the old 
bulls, as with all gregarious antelopes, were frequently 
solitary. The coloring of both the giant eland and the roan 
