Page:Seven Years in South Africa v1.djvu/60

 poses of a pursuer by the very coquetry of its antics. Unfortunately, however, sportsmen are proof against any charms of this sort; and under the ruthless hands of the Dutch farmers, and the unsparing attacks of the natives, it is an animal that is every day becoming more and more rare.

The bounds of the springbock may, perhaps, be best compared to the jerks of a machine set in motion by watch-spring. It will allow any dog except a greyhound to approach it within quite a moderate distance; it will gaze, as if entirely unconcerned, while the dog yelps and howls, apparently waiting for the scene to come to an end, when all at once it will spring with a spasmodic leap into the air, and, alighting for a moment on the ground six feet away, will leap up again, repeating the movement like an indiarubber ball bounding and rebounding from the earth. Coming to a stand-still, it will wait awhile for the dog to come close again; but ere long it recommences its springing bounds, and extricates itself once more from the presence of danger. And so, in alternate periods of repose and activity, the chase goes on, till the antelope, wearied out as it were by the sport, makes off completely, and becomes a mere speck on the distant plain.

But the agility of the nimble creature cannot save it from destruction. Since the discovery of the diamond-fields thousands of them, as well as of the allied species, the blessbock and the black gnu, have been slain. The Dutch farmers, who are owners of the districts where the antelopes abound,