BOS GAURUS. 22$ 



and Sumatra* It occurs in Java, Bali, and Borneo, and besides the 

 wild animals largo herds exist in Java and perhaps in Sumatra in a 

 domesticated state. 



Bos frentaUs.—l have left this to the last, as the question of the 

 range and even of the existence of the wild animal is disputed. 

 The Gfayal or Mithan is kept tame by the hill-tribes on both sides 

 of Assam valley and throughout the Chittagong hills as far south as 

 the neighbourhood of Akyab in Arrakan. According to the earlier 

 accounts, both wild and tame animals are found in the hill-ranges 

 south of Assam ; and an elaborate account was given in the Linnean 

 Transactions, Vol. VII., p. 303, by Mr. Macrae (quoted by Mr. Lam- 

 bert) of the manner in which the Kukis captured the wild herds by 

 the help of the tame (xayals. It is quite possible that this story 

 may have been devised by the inventive faculty of Mr. Macrae's 

 informant, though the account in itself has more innate probability 

 than most of the legends about animals that we owe to the imagina- 

 tion of the natives of India, whether civilized or not. Some recent 

 writers, and especially Mr. J. Sarbo* who writes apparently with 

 good opportunities for knowing, declare that there is no such animal 

 as a wild Bos frontalis known, at all events in the country extending 

 from Assam to Arrakan. Blyth too,f only notices the wild race as 

 numerous in the Mishmi hills and other hill-ranges bordering on 

 Upper Assam, and states that it is the domestic race that extends 

 southward to near Akyab. 



It has even been suggested (though certainly not by Mr. Sarbo, 

 who clearly appreciates the distinction between the two) that Bos 

 frontalis is a domestic race of Bos gaums. This is not impossible, 

 but at the same time it is not, I think, a probable view, because if it 

 were the case, as both animals inhabit the same forests, and as the 

 tame herds of Bos frontalis are said to roam freely during the day, 

 merely returning at night to their owner's village, the two would 

 assuredly interbreed ; and it is incredible that the difference between 

 Bos gaurus and Bos frontalis should be so constant as it is, and so 

 very much more marked than in the case of the wild and tame 

 Buffalo, although the range of the tame animal in the latter case is 



* P. Z. S. 1883, p. 143. 



t Cat. Mamm. Mus. As. Soc, 1863, p. 162. 



