704 
AFRICAN GAME ANIMALS 
like the oryx, with which they were associated, although it 
is said that the oryx can go without drinking while the 
zebra cannot, and so is found in much drier regions. The 
great enemy of the big zebra, as of the common zebra and 
the oryx, was the lion; and we also found one instance in 
which a leopard had killed a half-grown kangani and actu¬ 
ally dragged part of the carcass into the branches of a thorn- 
tree. 
Aside from the well-marked difference in color pattern, the 
Grevy zebra has distinctive differences in body proportions 
and shape. The head is decidedly enlarged and lengthened, 
the hoofs are broad, and the ears are greatly expanded and 
lengthened, exceeding in width the long ears of the African 
ass. The broad ears are apparently an adaptation which 
conforms with the brushy nature of their habitat, where 
acute hearing is of vital importance, and the broad hoofs 
are also to be attributed to environmental effect, that is, 
to the sandy and porous nature of much of the desert area 
in which they dwell. The tail tuft is rather small and con¬ 
fined to the extreme tip of the tail. The body coloration is 
quite distinctive. It consists of numerous, narrow trans¬ 
verse stripes, alternate whitish and blackish in color and 
of equal width, except on the neck, where the dark stripes 
are broader. An important distinction in the Grevy is 
the absence of diagonal or longitudinal stripes on the rump 
and hips, where the stripes are transverse. In the moun¬ 
tain zebra of South Africa there is a suggestion of this pat¬ 
tern in the narrow gridiron of the rump. In general, the 
color pattern resembles more closely that of the latter species 
than the quagga or bonte-quagga type. The stripes of the 
head are arranged quite as in the other two species. The 
sexes are quite indistinguishable in coloration, and the newly 
born young are essentially the same in pattern, though some¬ 
what lighter in color. The ground-color, or rather the color 
of the light stripes, is pale ochraceous-buff, except on the 
under-parts and inside of the legs, where it is more whitish 
or cream color. The dark stripes vary in intensity from 
