United States or Spain ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
For instance, the name "granti" is applied to the gazelle first discovered by the explorer Grant. "Thompsoni" is applied to the gazelle discovered by Thompson. "Cokei" is the name given the hartebeest discovered by Coke, and so on. If Colonel Roosevelt had discovered a new variation of any of the species it would be called the "Roosevelti ."
The thing that seems most noteworthy is that within six or seven miles from Nairobi, nearly all the time within sight of the house-tops of that town, we had seen fifteen varieties of wild game, some of which were present in great numbers. Wildebeest Hartebeest Hyena Jackal Thompson's Gazelle Lion Rabbit Waterbuck Impalla Giant Bustard Ostrich Wart-hog Wild Dog Steinbuck Grant's Gazelle
We also never saw them in water, but usually not a great distance from a marsh or stream. They were much shier than the hartebeest and zebra, and upon seeing our approach would be the first to run away. And by a curious chance the does seemed to know that it was the buck only that was in danger.
Keen-eyed fish-eagles and bustards poised on trees above the sinuous Gombe thought, and probably with good reason that I was after them; judging by the ready flight with which both species disappeared as they sighted my approach. Ah, no! nothing but hartebeest, zebra, giraffe, eland, and buffalo this day!
Enormous herds of hartebeest and wildebeest were on each side, and countless zebras. That night two of us heard the first bark of the zebra, and we thought it must be the bark of distant dogs. It was one of our first surprises to learn that zebras bark instead of neigh.
The hartebeest made one last despairing effort to escape, but, finding that speed would no longer avail, the creature wheeled suddenly round, and placed itself in an attitude of defiance the foam falling from its lips, while its red eyes sparkled like coals of fire. In another moment the dogs were around it. "What a splendid pack!" exclaimed Von Bloom. "Oh! that I had such an one!
"Inspann and trek!" was the command: and Swartboy, who was proud of the reputation he had earned as a wagon-driver, was now seen waving his bamboo whip like a great fishing-rod. "Inspann and trek!" echoed Swartboy, tying upon his twenty-feet lash a new cracker, which he had twisted out of the skin of the hartebeest antelope.
Within a dozen yards of the cliff lay the body of the hartebeest, where it had been "pulled down" by the dogs. It was already half-eaten, not by the hounds that had hunted it, but by their puppies of all ages, that to the number of more than threescore were now standing around the carcass, tugging away at its flesh and snarling at one another!
The consequence was, as no buffaloes were to be found, I got no sport, though I wounded a hartebeest, and followed him almost into camp, when I gave up the chase to some negroes, and amused myself by writing to Rumanika, to say if Grant did not reach me by a certain date, I would try to navigate the N'yanza, and return to him in boats up the Kitangule river.
It was the very perfection of the kind of effect aimed at in a highly kept park; with a magnificent stream from 600 to 700 yards wide, dotted with islets and rocks, the former occupied by fishermen's huts, the latter by sterns and crocodiles basking in the sun, flowing between the fine high grassy banks, with rich trees and plantains in the background, where herds of the nsunnu and hartebeest could be seen grazing, while the hippopotami were snorting in the water, and florikan and guinea-fowl rising at our feet.
Word Of The Day