THE GAUR AND THE GAYAL. 233 



horns. My record head is that of a magnificent bull which I shot on 

 the 1st of January 1893 ; these horns are a bright reddish only tipped 

 with black. Another head, which I saw, of a bull shot in a trap by 

 Kukies within a few miles of the same place is green practically 

 throughout, the black tips, which I imagine originally existed, having 

 been almost entirely worn out. 



After the head points already referred to, and which are shewn 

 more or less in the drawings, there remains only the facial angle of 

 the lower part of the head to be dealt with from a side view, and this 

 is one which has to be studied from the living animal ; of course this 

 depends almost entirely on the shape of the nasal bones, and from 

 what I have already written it will be seen that normally the wild 

 animal shews a ram-nosed profile, and the tame much the same side 

 view as that of an ordinary cow. Whereas, though the latter seldom 

 shews much variation, the former varies extremely. One of the first gaur 

 I ever shot was a huge bull, which I came upon very suddenly as it 

 stood grazing in a sea of grass some four feet high. I was enabled 

 to get very close before firing, and my attention was at once drawn 

 to the very remarkable ram-faced profile it exhibited, the more so that 

 I had the previous day shot another bull, the angle of whose face 

 appeared quite straight. A third bull, which had been grazing with 

 the ram-nosed one, but which 1 did not get until the following morn- 

 ing, did not have the ram-nose half so developed. I have, therefore, 

 come to the conclusion that the variation shewn in this respect is 

 merely individual, and is of no specific value. 



Ihe principal characteristic, as shown by the next series of drawings, 

 is the shape of the crest or vortex of the skull as it lies between the 

 horns. It is one on which great stress is laid by naturalists and sports- 

 men, but which is shown by this series to be of no value whatsoever. 

 According to the hitherto accepted theories the gayal or tame form 

 never has any signs of the cylindrical crest, which is, on the other 

 hand, invariably present in the gaur or wild form. I can find no trace 

 of any record of wild animals, reported as gaur, which have not 

 been credited with this cylindrical crest and, vice versa, I can find 

 none of so called gayal, wild or tame, which have been said to have it. 

 Blanford mentions, " Mammalia of India," p. 487, et seq. a skull 

 of the gaur obtained in the Mishmi Hills which wants the frontal 

 cavity, but no mention is made of the absence of the cylindrical 

 crest. 



