[Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa by David Livingstone]@TWC D-Link bookMissionary Travels and Researches in South Africa CHAPTER 5 20/30
Nor is it want of water, for this antelope is one of the most abstemious in that respect. Their nature prompts them to seek as their favorite haunts level plains with short grass, where they may be able to watch the approach of an enemy.
The Bakalahari take advantage of this feeling, and burn off large patches of grass, not only to attract the game by the new crop when it comes up, but also to form bare spots for the springbuck to range over. It is not the springbuck alone that manifests this feeling.
When oxen are taken into a country of high grass, they are much more ready to be startled; their sense of danger is increased by the increased power of concealment afforded to an enemy by such cover, and they will often start off in terror at the ill-defined outlines of each other.
The springbuck, possessing this feeling in an intense degree, and being eminently gregarious, becomes uneasy as the grass of the Kalahari becomes tall.
The vegetation being more sparse in the more arid south, naturally induces the different herds to turn in that direction.
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