>776- -vertebra of the back, which projects above a foot beyond the reft. From the breaft to the ground it meafures five feet and a half; the neck, which is decorated with a mane like that of the zebra, is fix feet long, and confequently twice the length o f the camel’s ; the head is above two feet in length, and fomewhat refembles the head of a iheep; the upper lip is rather larger and thicker than the -under, but both o f them are covered with ftiff hairs; the eyes of this creature are large and beautiful; its fore teeth fmall, and eight in number, and are only to be found in the lower jaw, though the animal has fix grinders on both fides of each jaw. Diretftly before the horns there is a knob, which proceeds from an elevation of part of the cranium, and projects two inches above the furface; and •behind them, or in the crag o f the neck, there are two fmaller ones, which are formed by the fubjacent glands; the horns -are feven inches long, i. e. a little lhorter than the ears; •they rather incline backwards, and are a little broader and Tounded off at the ends, where they are encircled with long ■hairs, which reach beyond the horny part, forming a tuft. In fine, the horns are covered, like thofe of other animals, with a cutaneous and hairy fubftance ; but the interior fub- ftance o f them is faid to refemble the heart or boney part df the horns of gazels and oxen, and to be proceffes of the fcull itfelf. On the horns of this beaft, when aged, there have been obferved fmall irregular elevations, which M. A llamand fuppofes to be the fhoots o f future 'branches. The colour pf this beaft is a White ground, with large •jeddifh fpots ftanding pretty clofe to each other; which . ‘ fpots, fpots, in the more aged animals, inclinò to a dark-brown or black, but in the others border upon the yellow. The tail is fmall and {lender, and is terminated by a large tuft pf very coarfe and moftly black fetaceous hairs ; the fore parts of the hoofs are much higher than the back parts. This creature has no fetlocks, as all other hoofed animals have. This animal when it goes fail does not limp, as fome have imagined, but fometimes paces,, and fometimes gallops. Every time it lifts up its fore feet it throws its neck back, which on other occafions it holds ereót; notwith- ftanding this, it is by no means flow when purfued, as M. de Buffon fuppofes it to be, but, on-the contrary,, it requires a fleet horfe to hunt it. In eating the grafs from off the ground, it fometimes bends one of its knees, as horfes do; and in plucking leaves- and fmall branches from high trees, it brings its fore .feet about a foot and a half nearer than common to the- hind feet. A Camelopardalis which Major Gordon wounded in the. leg, fo that it could not raife itfelf from the ground,, neverthelefs did not flrew the leaft figns of anger or re- fentment; but when its throat was cut, fpurned againft the ground with a force far beyond that o f any other animal. The vifcera refembled thofe of gazels, but this animal' had no porus cerifèrus. The flefh of the young, ones - is very good, eating, but fometimes has a ftrong flavour of. a certain Ihrub, which is fuppofed to be a fpecies of m i- mofa. The Hottentots are particularly fond of the mar-- mw, and chiefly for the fake of this hunt the beaft,. and: kill! 1776. January.
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