492 
AFRICAN GAME ANIMALS 
On the average we found its horns longer, but this may be 
merely an accident of geography, for locality has much to 
do with the size of an antelope’s horns, no matter what the 
species—and, extraordinary to say, the horns of one species, 
say the impalla, may be less than the average size in a 
region where the horns of another, as the waterbuck, may 
be larger. It seems curious, inasmuch as so many African 
antelope have short and even rather thin coats, to find these 
marsh-loving, thicket-haunting waterbuck, dwelling right 
under the equator, with coats as long and shaggy as those of 
northern deer. 
From Lake Naivasha westward we found the defassa; 
and from the Nyanza Lakes it extended down the Nile to 
the mouth of the Sobat. Everywhere the waterbucks were 
gregarious, and, therefore, polygamous, a heavy bull ac¬ 
companying each herd of cows and young. The exact 
habitat in which they were found varied in rather astonish¬ 
ing manner. Around Lake Naivasha their home was in 
the dense papyrus beds which fringed the lake. The high, 
close-growing stems of the huge reeds formed a well-nigh 
impenetrable cover, save where the waterbuck had trodden 
out their trails. These made a network, a labyrinth which 
extended almost, but not quite, to the lake’s edge, meeting 
and being crossed by the broader hippo trails which, of 
course, did go down to—or rather come up from—the 
water’s edge. When alarmed the herds at once fled to the 
papyrus for protection, and loud was the noise as they 
crashed and crowded along the trails, splashing through the 
mud and water while the dead stalks cracked and popped. 
These reeds were merely their refuge and resting-place, and 
held no food for them. They fed outside them, grazing in 
