Quagga

Hand-colored aquatint showing a quagga within a scenic backdrop of savanna and mountains. Quaggas were members of the Equidae family related to plains zebra. They lived in grasslands and savannas across southern Africa where they grazed mostly on grasses. Uncontrolled hunting reduced their presence substantially in the 19th century, resulting in their complete extinction just before the start of the 20th. The author describes this species as follows:

It is generally found in numerous herds that are mostly accompanied by a few hartebeests and ostriches. They are tolerably swift; but the boors sometimes succeed by stratagem to take them alive, by throwing the noose of a rope over their heads. By domestication it soon becomes mild and tractable, and might be rendered extremely useful by patient training; yet abundant as they are in the country, there are few instances of their being put in harness. They are stronger than the mule; live hardily, and are never out of flesh. They are variously marked; some with waved stripes on the neck only, others with bands across the shoulder, and others marked on the haunches, somewhat like the Zebra... This animal is found on all the plains behind the first range of mountains beyond the Cape Peninsula.