The book of antelopes, vol. 4 (of 4)Sclater, Philip Lutley
Science
The book of antelopes, vol. 4 (of 4)
Sclater, Philip Lutley
Antelopes
_Bushbuck from the Chobe River_, =Selous=, Hunter’s Wanderings, p. 208,
& p. 285, pl.; id. P. Z. S. 1881, p. 753.
_Tragelaphus scriptus ornatus_, =Pocock=, Ann. & Mag. N. H., Jan. 1900.
Vernacular Names:—_Guib_ of Negroes of Senegal (_Adanson_); _Zaloufe_ or
_Oualof_ of the Gambia (_Whitfield_); _Red Deer_ of the Liberians
(_Büttikofer_); _Thamma_ by the Batawana and _Tugwumgo_ by the Bazèyè
of the Upper Zambesi (_Chapman_).
_Male adult._ Height about 28 inches. General colour a rich dark
red, passing in places into black. Head fawn-colour, with an ashy-black
band extending from between the eyes to the muzzle; upper lip white at
the sides; chin and inter-ramal area white; two white spots on each
cheek, the lower fusing with the white of the inter-ramal area; a small
white stripe running inwards from the eye, sometimes but not always
present; whitish patch at base of ear; ear ashy black behind, a dark
spot near the outer edge in front. Neck greyish fawn above, clouded
with black towards the shoulders. Throat with two, upper and lower,
white patches; area between the patches a dusky yellowish grey. Body
a rich dark red at the sides, passing into black below, marked with
about half-a-dozen transverse white stripes; a few white spots on the
shoulders, and a large, though variable, number of white spots on the
haunches; a white line, sometimes broken up into a series of spots,
running longitudinally along the lower portion of the sides above
the belly between the shoulder and the hind-quarters, and an upper
longitudinal white stripe, sometimes long, sometimes short, running
backwards from the shoulder. Tail red, with white edges and usually a
black tip. Belly and chest blackish. Outer side of fore and hind legs
blackish above the knees and hocks, reddish fawn below; inner sides
white at the bases close up to body; a broad black band above the knee
and hock; back and inner sides of the knee and front and inner side of
hock white, whence a white stripe extends downwards along the inner
side and anterior edge of the cannon-bone to the fetlock; fetlocks and
pasterns blackish; pasterns with a large white patch in front.
Hairs on body longish. At the base of the neck there is a more or less
well-defined collar of short hair passing inferiorly above the lower
white neck-band. Along the back from the shoulders to the root of the
tail extends a crest or mane of long hairs, black over the withers,
tipped with white on the rest of the back. Horns as in preceding
species.
The skull of an adult male gives the following measurements:—Basal
length 8·25 inches, nose to orbit 4·75, width 3·5, horn 9·5.
_Female_ similar to the male, but without horns, and without the
black tints on the body; white markings very conspicuous.
_Young_ like the female.
_Hab._ Forest-districts of Western Africa from Senegal to Angola,
and extending thence to the Chobé on the south.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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