. Wild scenes of a hunter's life; . CHAPTER L. HUNTING THE GIRAFFE.—HABITS OF THE ELEPHAN\ R. GUMMING thus describ**^ tusgiraffe. These gigantic and ex«quisiteiy beautiful animals, whichare admirably formed by natureto adorn the fair forests that clothethe boundless plains of the mter-ior,are widely distributed through-out the interior of Southern Africa,but are nowhere to be met with in great numbers. In countriesunmolested by the intrusive foot of man, the giraffe is found gen-. 294 HUNTING ADVENTURES. erally in herds varying froiii twelve to sixteen ; but I have notunfrequently met with her
. Wild scenes of a hunter's life; . CHAPTER L. HUNTING THE GIRAFFE.—HABITS OF THE ELEPHAN\ R. GUMMING thus describ**^ tusgiraffe. These gigantic and ex«quisiteiy beautiful animals, whichare admirably formed by natureto adorn the fair forests that clothethe boundless plains of the mter-ior,are widely distributed through-out the interior of Southern Africa,but are nowhere to be met with in great numbers. In countriesunmolested by the intrusive foot of man, the giraffe is found gen-. 294 HUNTING ADVENTURES. erally in herds varying froiii twelve to sixteen ; but I have notunfrequently met with herds containing thirty individuals, and onone occasion I counted forty together ; this however was ov/ing tochance, and about sixteen may be reckoned as the average numberof a herd. These herds are composed of giraffes of various sizes,from the young giraffe of nine or ten feet in height, to the dark chest-nut-colored old bull of the herd, whose exalted head towers abovehis companions, generally attaining a height of upward of eighteenfc~t. The females are of lower stature and more delicatelyformed than the males, their height averaging from sixteen toseventeen feet. Some writers have discovered ugliness and awant of grace in the giraffe, but I consider that he is one of themost strikingly beautiful animals in the creation ; and when a herdof them is seen scattered through a grove of the picturesqueparasol-topped acacias which adorn their native plains, and onwhose uppermost
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1850, bookpublishe, booksubjecthunting
