MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 901 



The measurements as recorded by Rowland Ward are as follows : — 



Right horn on curve ... 59£" 



„ straight 

 Left horn on curve 

 „ „ straight 

 Girth 



Spread from tip to tip 

 The age of the animal was judged by the shikari with me to be about 12 



years. 



H. BARSTOW, Captain, 



(38th Dogras,) 

 Assist. I. O., Kashmir Imperial Service Infantry. 

 Gilgit, Kashmir, 31s< May 1908. 



42|" 

 60f" 

 39^" 

 11|" 

 46" 



No. IV.— THE PERIOD OF GESTATION IN MAMMALS. 



In few matters connected with natural history is our information so vague 

 and unsatisfactory as it is with regard to the duration of the period of gesta- 

 tion in different species of mammals. From the very nature of the case, it is, 

 of course, a subject in regard to which there is great difficulty in acquiring 

 accurate information, and as a general rule, such information can be obtained 

 only from animals in captivity. Even, however, in the case of species which 

 have long been domesticated remarkable mis-statements have not unfrequently 

 been made. As regards the guinea-pig, for example, it was stated by Schreber 

 that the period of gestation was only three weeks, and this statement seems 

 to have been generally accepted till 1891, when the late Professor A. Nehriug, 

 of Berlin pointed out that it was really sixty-three days. In the case of wild 

 species errors are still more serious, as exemplified in the case of the tapir, 

 whose gestation period is stated in the second edition of Brehm'a lierhben 

 to be four instead of thirteen months. In these circumstances it is satisfactory 

 to know that Dr. O. Heinroth, of the Berlin Zoological Gardens, has taken 

 up the study of this subject in a thorough and careful manner, and that the 

 results of some of his investigations have been published in a recent issue 

 of the Zoologischer Beobachters (vol. xlix., p. 1), wherein he expresses his 

 indebtedness to Dr. Wunderlich Koln and Mr. Blaauw for many details. The 

 list includes a large number of species whose gestation periods have been 

 determined with more or less complete accuracy ; and from these the following- 

 items are selected : — 



The hoofed or ungulate mammals present the longest duration of gestation 

 in the whole class, and it is noteworthy that, as a whole, the perissodactyles 

 exceed the artiodactyles in this respect, the period of gestation in the rhino- 

 ceroses, however, being still unknown. The list is headed by the Indian 

 elephant, in which the period ranges from 20 months 21 days to ' 2 months ; 

 next comes the giraffe with 14 months, the American tapir with 13 or 13^. 

 the Indian tapir with 13, the Somali wild ass and its domesticated relative. 



