3-021-175 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Herd of quaggas on the plains of the Vaal River, South Africa, 1868. Engraving from a sketch by Thomas Baines, made in 1850, '...in the plains south of the Vaal River. Immense herds of wild animals congregate there in the dry weather, when the smaller rivulets and pools are deprived of water. They consist chiefly of the "Boute quagga", or "Burchell's zebra", the "blees-bok", the gnu or "wilde-beeste" (both of the black and the brindled varieties), the "harte-beeste", many small antelopes, and ostriches; while vultures hover above, ready to descend upon the carcass of any that may be killed. The common, or half-shaped quagga is more often seen in Kaffirland, while the zebra is met with in mountainous districts'. 'Kaffirland' was the descriptive name given to the southeast part of what is today the Eastern Cape of South Africa. The term kaffir is now an offensive racial slur in South Africa. The quagga was hunted to extinction in the late 19th century. From "Illustrated London News", 1868.