4 
In common with the ox and buffalo, the Gnoo has an unconquerable aversion to scarlet—pawing the earth and becoming per- 
fectly furious at the sudden display of that colour. In situations where these whimsical animals had been rendered more than usually 
wild by the incessant persecutions of the border Colonists, I frequently found it requisite, in order to allure the herd within range, to 
hoist a red pocket handkerchief upon the muzzle of my rifle. This exhibition invariably produced the most violent. tumult and excite- 
ment, and caused the whole troop to charge past in single file— with mane erect and blazing eye’—following their leader, flinging out 
their taper heels, whisking their streaming tails, butting with their horns in so menacing a manner, and displaying emotions of such 
violent frenzy, that I was fain to strike my colors, and have recourse to my weapons—when they instantly wheeled, and pranced confi- 
, 
dently round at a safer distance, headed by their swarthy chief : 
* Fierce on the Hunter’s hostile band 
He rolls his eye of burnished glow: 
Spurns with black hoof and horns the sand, 
And tosses high his mane of snow.” 
, De jagt* van de wilde heest forms a favourite diversion of the Dutch Colonists, and occupies a very large portion of the apparently 
valueless time of the trek-boors, or nomade farmers, who graze their overgrown flocks and herds on the verdant meadows lying beyond 
the borders of the sterile colony. The carease of a full grown wilde beest, even when “broken,” forms a fair load for a pack-horse ; the 
flesh, which is very insipid and usually quite destitute of fat, resembling very coarse beef in quality. A. joint is therefore never dressed 
by the good vrow without having first been garnished with huge lumps of sheep's tail fat—a sine gua non in Dutch cookery,—dexte- 
rously thrust with the point of the thumb into perforations carved for their reception; which done, it is placed in the iron oven, with 
abundance of lard, and literally baked to rags! On account of its Jeanness, however, it is generally cut into strips, and converted into 
biltung, by bemg dried in the sun. The silky tail of the Gnoo, which is in great demand for making chowries, forms an article of export ; 
and the hide, when brayed, is employed by the Colonists for riems, or thongs, with which to harness oxen in the team, and indeed for 
every purpose to which hempen rope, twine, and string, are usually applied in other countries. 
When eaptured young, the Gnoo, may be reared by the hand upon cow’s milk, with little difficulty, and although uncertain in 
temper, may readily be induced, in its domesticated state, to herd with the cattle on the farm ;—daily going out to, and returning with 
them from pasture, and exhibiting no inclination to resume its pristine liberty. Amongst its other eccentricities and peculiarities, how- 
ever, it is said to be liable to a cutaneous eruption of the skin, which generally proves fatal, and is so apt to be communicated to its 
bovine companions, that the farmer will not often admit of its presence. In common with its congener, the Brindled Gnoo, and some 
few other tenants of the African wilderness, hereafter to be noticed—whose horns are invariably placed on a high ridge upon the 
summit of the frontals—a certain cavity above the brain is literally crammed with a large description of fatty white dot, numbers of 
which are expelled whenever the animal snorts ; the whole coming voluntarily away after its death, through the channel of the nostrils, 
which are covered with a muscular valve or flap, shutting down like a trap door so as to close the apertures. This phenomenon, to 
which I was not disposed to afford credit until I had actually witnessed it some twenty times, may possibly account for the petulant 
freaks and hair-brained caprices of this absurd quadruped ;—the irritation caused by the maggots no doubt frequently bringing on a kind 
of furor which may even cause its dissolution. Tn a single heap I have seen so many as two or three hundred mouldering skulls; and 
forming an opinion from the numerous skeletons in all stages of decomposition, with which the lone pastures in the interior are every 
where strewed, the mortality amongst the species must be very great—numbers falling, before the poisoned shafts of the diminutive 
Bushman, as well as under the talons of the prowling Lion—man, beast, and insect, alike proving the enemy of this most whimsical of 
Nature’s vagaries. 
* Pronounced yak; anglicé, hunting the Gnoo. 
