MAMMALIA, 



Few persons are aware of the great difficulty that exists 

 in ascertaining the species, and sometimes the genera of 

 animals in an unexplored country, as these Provinces were 

 some twenty years ago. At that time the rusa deer was, 

 according to some authorities, a wild cow, and according 

 to others, an elk ; the gaur was a bison ; the paradoxure, 

 a racoon ; the bamboo rat, a mole ; the wild hog, a bar- 

 byrussa ; the gymnura, an oppossum ; the wild dog, a wolf ; 

 the leopard, a cheetah ; a deer the nylghau ; the goat- 

 antelope, a wild sheep ; and we had " a goat with one 

 horn resembling the celebrated unicorn," and twenty 

 other animals which are now as really extinct in the 

 Provinces as the mammoth and the megatherium, and 

 for which one would no more think of looking than for 

 the Dean of Westminster's pet, which he describes as 



" O'er bog, or steep, through strait, rough, dense or rare, 

 With head, hands, wings, or feet, pursues his way, 

 And swims, or sinks, or wadea, or creeps, or flies."* 



In those days the jungle traveller was entertained at 

 evening by the natives around the brush fire, with won- 

 derful descriptions of the extraordinary animals, that peo- 

 pled the surrounding forests. One was found exactly like 

 an elephant, but never had tusks, and was banded across 

 the body with white This proved to be the tapir. Ano- 

 ther had a skin like a cow, a mane like a horse, and 

 horns like a goat — the goat antelope. The third was half 

 a dog and half a hog — the sand-badger. And a fourth 

 was represented as in a transition state towards a mon- 

 key, just such an animal as would certainly become a 

 monkey in the next state ; this was the loris. 



Since Mr. Blyth became Curator ©f the Museum of the 

 Asiatic Society, by far the greater proportion of the mam- 

 malia of these Provinces and Arracan has passed under his 

 eye ; and to him we are principally indebted for our know- 

 ledge of species. 



• The Pterodactyle. 



