OCR Text |
Show 1897.] OF THE GENUS CERVICArRA. 897 where a native could find them, hanging my handkerchief up in a sugar-bush as a guide. "I have placed the entire skin and skull of the largest rara, together with the entire skin of the young ewe, and the body-skin of a normal coloured Mountain Beedbuck ram, in the hands of Mr. Oldfield Thomas, to be deposited, after exhibition, in the National Collection. " Although at present Mr. Thomas is doubtful whether these Antelopes can fairly be considered a new and undescribed permanent; variety, I am myself very confident that they will eventually prove to be so. I hope before long to be enabled to confirm my opinion that they occur throughout the highest portion of the range, for 1 think it most unlikely that they are confined to the comparatively restricted area which we visited, and I only regret that I was prevented from pursuing my investigations further at the time. " It is scarcely credible that albinism should show itself in this form, though I admit, as Mr. Thomas points out, that the white hoofs lend colour to this supposition. But if this be the case, it is very singular that no intermediate forms showing less tendency to albinism-as, for instance, individuals lacking the white spot on the frontal and the pure white tail *-have ever been found amongst the normal coloured ones, or even that no such one was either seen or killed by us; and, further, that no normal coloured individual was seen amongst the Antelopes on the summit. " In conclusion, I propose that, until we are in possession of further details as to the occurrence of this singularly marked Antelope, it should be styled ' Cervicapra fulvorufula subalbina7 " As can be seen from the specimens now exhibited, it is in many respects similar to the ordinary Mountain Beedbuck, but differs from it most markedly in having all four legs white from the knees down, white hoofs, a pure white tail both above and below, a white ' kol' or spot on the frontal, and a more or less clearly defined white stripe down the back of the neck and along the dorsal line ; while the white of the belly is continued further up the flanks than in the true Cervicupra fulvorufula. " The male specimen in the British Museum may be looked upon as the type of the name suggested." In conclusion Mr. Thomas expressed the opinion that-whether species, subspecies, or aberration-this Antelope, which had the general characters of a semi-albino, but was practically constant, and in considerable numbers held the entire monopoly of a mountain plateau, presented a problem of the utmost interest to students of Variation ; and he was glad to be able to say that Mr. Kirby was now again going out to the same district, and would do his best to obtain further evidence on the subject. 1 [As a fact, there are some slight differences between tbe two specimens, and even between the two sides of one of them, but these differences are so slight that it would not be fair to use them as an argument against Mr. Kirby's view.-O. T.] |