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They stood about fourteen hands high, and were of a beautiful deep cream colour, with short black manes, black switched tails similar to that of the gemsbok, and their legs were black from the knee downward.
David, who was with me, ran out to meet them. "They have got a gemsbok!" he exclaimed; "one of the most interesting of the antelope tribe. It is known also as the oryx." "How did you catch it?" he asked. "We found it in the pit!" exclaimed the boys at once; "the mother and the young one. Poor little creature.
Little Truey ran into the inner room and brought out an immense volume bound in gemsbok skin, with a couple of strong brass clasps upon it to keep it closed.
One morning, having discovered with the telescope that three of these gemsbok were some miles distant on a rising ground, they set off, accompanied by a portion of the Hottentots on foot, who were desired to go round, so as to drive the animals towards the camp.
And presently the advance guard of the great army appeared against the skyline on the edge of the beetling cliffs, almost immediately opposite where I was standing; first a solitary eland, then three gemsbok, closely followed by seven or eight hartebeeste, then a small troop of quagga, upon the heels of which came a herd of some fifty klipspringers.
Now a huge buffalo would leap into the pit through the slender covering of rushes; now a tall giraffe would go toppling over; an active koodoo or gemsbok would spring over their heads, to fall hopelessly into the same trap. In a short time the whole pit was filled with a living, moving, struggling mass of animals, fearful to look at.
However, my opinion is that you will have to kill a lion before you have travelled much further, without going in quest of him. There are hundreds of them here; as many as there are in Namaqua-land." "Look, master!" said Bremen, pointing to seven or eight splendid antelopes about a mile distant. "I see," replied the Major. "What are they?" "Gemsbok," said Swinton.
They live in extensive herds on the karoos; and are hunted by the natives for their skins out of which the Kaffirs make their karosses. Their flesh is eaten; though it is not so much esteemed as that of some other antelopes. The Oryx, or Gemsbok, is a middle-sized species, dwelling in the same neighbourhood with the gnus.
Not without cost to themselves, however; for there in the centre of what had been the pool lay a huge lion, dead, transfixed and impaled upon the long, sharp, straight horns of the magnificent gemsbok bull, that lay, with broken neck, almost hidden beneath the lion's formidable bulk. "Wow!" said Inyati; "I have heard of the like before.
For strangely enough all of these animals appear to be absolutely independent of water, and some of them notably the gemsbok, apparently never drink. There came a day when we entered an entirely different region, though still the sand stretched in all directions.
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