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Updated: June 18, 2025
At the base of these very cliffs on which the Ovis montana disports itself, roams the prong-horn, not very dissimilar either in form, colour, or habits; and yet this creature, trusting to its heels for safety, feels at home and secure only on the wide open plain where it can see the horizon around it!
May we not gently suggest to the reader for his or her consideration that there are human antelopes, so to speak, whose case bears a striking resemblance to the prong-horn of the North American prairie? Dick's horse was no match for the antelope, neither was Crusoe; so they pulled up shortly and returned to their companions, to be laughed at.
We have decided not to bring any more specimens to our institution, partly because all available candidates seem reasonably certain to be affected with lumpy-jaw, and partly because we are unwilling to run further risks of having other hoofed animals inoculated by them. Today we are anxiously wondering whether the jaw disease of the prong-horn is destined to exterminate the species.
As an exhibition animal in zoological gardens and parks it is a failure; for it always looks faded, spiritless and dead, like a stuffed animal ready to be thrown into the discard. Zoologists can not save the prong-horn species save at long range, in preserves so huge that the sensitive little beast will not even suspect that it is confined.
At present I can only say that Africa is the great antelope country, although many fine species exist also in Asia that in America there is but one kind, the prong-horn, with which you are already well acquainted and that in Europe there are two, though one of these, the well-known "chamois," is as much goat as antelope.
A dark covert in the thick woods offered us a more secure kitchen. There we rekindled our fire and roasting the ribs of the prong-horn, refreshed ourselves with an ample meal. After an hour's repose, we resumed our journey in confident expectation, that before sunset we should get within sight of the caravan.
The next time was under similar circumstances, the Apaches picking up the sign of his having passed over the plain close beside a patch of rising ground, where he had been tempted into shooting a prong-horn antelope, lighting a fire, and making a hearty meal, of which he stood sadly in need.
But, in spite of his prosperity and the constant demand for his services in connection with the mines and the increase of the town, Bart never forgot his delight in a ramble in the wilds; and whenever time allowed, and the Beaver and some of his followers had come in from some hunting expedition, there was just a hint to Joses, when before daybreak next morning a start was made either to hunt bison and prong-horn, the black-tailed deer in the woods at the foot of the mountain, or to fish in some part of the canyon.
In Australia no antelope has yet been found; nor even in the large island of Madagascar, so African in its character. Only one representative of the antelopes is indigenous to the New World the Prong-horn of the prairies; for the Bighorn of the Rocky Mountains is a sheep, not an antelope.
The prong-horn antelope of the Western plains is another favorite food-animal with hunters, and the various "small game," such as squirrels, rabbits, woodchucks, etc., are by no means to be despised. The author once knew a trapper who was loud in his praises of "skunk meat" for food, and many hunters can testify to its agreeable flavor when properly dressed and cooked.
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