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212 VISITS TO MADAGASCAR, CHAP. Till. dred yards of them, when they cocked up their tails and can tered away. They were all of a tawny brown colour, with the ends of their tails white. In their size and their paces they looked more like ponies with excessive hog manes, than ani mals of the ox species. During the day we passed herd after herd, varying in number from five to twenty in each, including the young ones. The spring-boks frequently crossed the road only a short distance before us, passing along by a succession of bounds, or vaulting leaps, with remarkable rapidity and gracefulness. Mile after mile these beautiful animals ap peared in varied numbers, scattered over the plains on either side. On our way we passed the waggon of a travelling boer, and purchased of him half a sheep and some flesh of the gnu for our men. About eleven o’clock, on the same morning, we crossed a rushy, muddy, but rather deep stream, called Seacow’s River, and soon afterwards, reaching a farm-house, we sent a man to ask if we could procure forage for our cattle, and a little bread for ourselves. The man returned to say that our wants could be supplied, and we were invited to alight. On reaching the house, a scene of refinement and taste, for which we had not been prepared, burst upon our view. We were ushered into a nice, elegantly-furnished room, on the walls of which hung some good pictures. A number of elegantly- bound volumes lay on the table, where also there was a shallow dish filled with fresh and fragrant flowers. Two young ladies welcomed us, and in a minute or two a tall, gentlemanly man entered, who bade us welcome in fine English, and pressed us to take breakfast, which was soon dispensed with true English hospitality and kindness by his daughter, while we conversed with our host. Alluding to the animals we had seen, he said that at certain seasons when drought pre vailed in other parts, the spring-boks came down to this neighbourhood in thousands; that he had sometimes shot