25 
How little resemblance did any of the portraits that I had seen of this superb animal, bear to the.ponderous original now lying 
at my feet! In place of the plethora for which the Eland is remarkable, the cunning artist must have surely striven to portray the fea- 
tures indicative of the last stage of a consumption! I was engaged in making a sketch of one of our noble victims, when the savages 
coming up, breathless with haste, proceeded with cold-blooded ferocity to stab the unfortunate and dying animmal—stirring up the blood, 
and shouting with barbarous exultation as the tide of life gushed from each newly inflicted wound,—regardless alike of our remon- 
strances, and of the eloquent and piteous appeal expressed in the beautiful clear black eye of the mild and inoffensive Eland, whose tears 
might well have wrung remorse from a far more ruthless disciple of Nimrod than myself, and have even caused him to sink the exulta- 
tion of the sportsman in the feelings of the moralist. The stoutest of our savage attendants could with difficalty transport the head to 
the waggons, where one of the Hottentots had just arrived with the carcase of a Sassaybe, that he had dragged a considerable distance, 
with the assistance of some twenty barbarians, who were no sooner made acquainted with the occurrences of the morning, than they 
set off at speed upon the fresh tracks of our horses, returning about sunset gorged to the throats, and groaning under an external load 
of meat, which they had found it quite impossible to make room for, and had therefore thriftily slung about their necks for a fa- 
ture occasion ! 
By all classes in Africa, the flesh of the Eland is deservedly esteemed over that of any other animal— 
“ Nor finer, nor fatter, 
Ler yonmed in a forest, or smoked on a platter.” 
Both in grain and color it resembles beef, but is far better tasted and more delicate, possessing a pure game flavor, and exhibiting the 
most tempting looking layers of fat aud lean—the surprising quantity of the former ingredient with which it is interlarded, exceeding 
that of any other game quadruped with which I am acquainted. The venison fairly melts in the mouth ; and as for the brisket, that is 
absolutely a cut for a monarch! With what satisfaction would not King Jamie of hunting memory, have drawn his good blade adown the 
breast of a plump Eland, to be rewarded with five full inches of “prime white fat on that ilk,” instead of three, as on the occasion tn 
Greenwich Park, when Nigel assisted his sporting Majesty in the sylvan ceremony. The vast quantity of tallow yielded by the fat bulls, 
furnished us with constant material for manufacturing “dips” in a candle mould with which we were provided ; and during the greater 
part of our journey it was to the flesh of this goodly beast that we principally looked for our daily rations, both on account of its vast 
superiority over all other wild flesh, and from the circumstance of its being obtainable in larger quantities with comparatively less labour. 
Pursued, the fat slnggards delay their flight as long as possible, but when no longer able to avert the evil hour, they go off at a smart 
pace, rallopping less clumsily, leaping, and clearing broken ground with much greater facility, than could be expected from their huge 
proportions. Once blown, however, the unfortunate beast is far more manageable than a Smithfield ox; and after giving the unwieldy 
old bulls a spurt in order to render them somewhat less frisky, in spite of their repeated attempts to break away—made wheneyer their 
wind returned—we were in the constant habit of driving them at a walk before our horses, to the camp, from their pastures several 
miles distant. No opportunity of levying a tax upon their herds was ever suffered to pass, We invariably selected the fattest and 
bonniest of the whole lot, and after hitting upon this plan of driving them up to the shambles, not only was the trouble of carrying the 
meat from a distance avoided, but a constant supply of hides obtained for the repair of our traces and waggou gear—a purpose for 
which they are most admirably adapted. Setting aside the utility of the quarrée, the hunting this splendid animal in such a fashion was 
go fall of novelty, that it could not fail to be looked upon as very “ pleawunte and full of pastyme.” By our followers the death of an 
Eland was considered the signal for a general carouse ; and our own kitchen, as in the days of Taylor the Water Poet, like that “of my 
good Lord Erskine, being alwayes made on the side of a banke, there were on these occasions many kettles and pottes boyling, and 
many spittes turning and winding, in truth with great variety of cheere, as venison baked, sodden, rost, and stu'de—the repast being 
finally crowned with libations of most potent aqueevite.” 
The Eland frequents the open prairies and low roclsy hills interspersed with clamps of wood, but is never to be met with m a 
continnously 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 seattered 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 im single files; 
the goodliest bulls leading the van : whereas during a retreat, these it is, that uniformly bring up the rear, As the day dawned over 
the boundless meads of the Vaal river spread with a rich carpet of Inxuriant herbage, and enamelled with pastures of brillant 
flowers, vast droves of these lordly animals were coustantly to be seen moving in solemn procession across the profile of the silent 
and trecless landscape, portions of which were often covered with long coarse grass, which when dry and waving its white haytike 
stalks to the breeze, imparted to the plain, the delusive and alluring appearance of ripe cornfields. It is a singular fact that the 
bodies of these stately animals are infested to a great extent by the ticks and parasitic flies which torment domestic cattle—the rank 
odour arising from a drove of them, moreover, exactly resembling the fetid exhalation from a cattle close, This taint being fully as 
strong as that of the ground on which sheep have been folded, may be winded at an ineredible distance. An initiated nose will 
never fail to sniff out the form upon which the Impoofo has been recently lying, many of the scrubby mimosa brakes in which they 
delight, being literally redolent of their musky scent. In such situations, a little casting about seldom fails to discover the Seestaeed 
figure of a portly bull, either chewing the eud beneath the scanty shade of some parasol-topped acacia, or raking his sharp and 
formidable horns against its rongh thorny stem. 
Amongst themselves the males have frequent and desperate battles, many specimens that came under our observation being 
covered both with sears and green wounds, and humbled also of one horn. This was the case with the largest we killed, which 
