On some Quadrupeds supposed to be extinct 369 



dug up ; and at these very places Hannibal and Asdrubal 

 defeated one hundred thousand Carpetani, many of whom were 

 trodden to death by their forty elephants *. 



If we glance at the sports of the Mongols, what a treasure 

 for an osteologist might be found at Termed in Sogdiana, 

 where the army commanded in person by Genghis Khan were 

 four months occupied in enclosing an immense circle, till all 

 the wild beasts were driven (without one escaping, under pain 

 of death to the soldier who failed in his duty, but who was 

 not allowed to kill the tigers, lions, &c.) into a spacious plain^ 

 where they were slaughtered by the Grand Khan and all the 

 Imperial princes and military commanders, till they chose to 

 permit the soldiers to end the destruction f . How many fossil 

 species might be discovered there, of which naturalists have no 

 knowledge ! The Persians are said to have slaughtered as many 

 as fourteen thousand beasts on alike expedition J. So long 

 have these amusements existed, that Hushing, king of Persia, 

 B. C. 865, bred dogs and leopards for hunting §. 



Besides the fossil remains which have been found of numerous 

 quadrupeds, named by the Romans in their sports, they em- 

 ployed the following, bones of which have not been detected : 

 — ^^Indian dogs, white bears, camels (one found), dromedaries, 

 camelopards, wild asses, zebras, quaggas, oryxes (unicorns), 

 Ethiopian sheep, Arabian sheep, the crocotta (bred from a dog 

 and wolf), crocuta (from a hyaena and lioness), little dragons, 

 ostriches. The gnu was known to the Romans ; and probably 

 the nyl-ghau and the om-kergay (quite harmless, and the size 

 of a rhinoceros). In this list several of the fossil kinds described 

 as the ancient wild beast with a thick skin (palaeotherium) , 

 and the beast without weapons, or unarmed (anoplotherium), 

 may be found, and also those of the genus canis, and a carni- 

 vorous beast II . 



Such is a short notice of this most extensive subject, to which 

 the writer's attention has been attracted by the concurrence of 



* Livy, b. xxi. ch. v. ; b. xxiv. ch. xlii. 



+ De la Croix. Hist, of Genghis, b. iii. ch. vii. 



% Sir John Chardin, vol. ii. 33. 



§ Sir WilUam Jones, vol. v. 588. The above may possibly mean a 

 cross breed of the two beasts, which we find is still practised in Cabu- 

 listan, as related in the Ayeen Akbery. 



II See Rees's Cvc. *♦ Strata." 



