308 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



In general the mammalian fauna may be said to be typically African, 

 with almost no trace of Eurasian species. It is a continuation of that 

 of the upper Nile, though rather more reduced, and in the region cov- 

 ered, quite without any of the desert species found in the Saharan 

 sands to the north and northwest. 



The list of species observed follows. 



Syncerus aequinoctialis (Blyth). 



Nile Valley Buffalo. 



Bubalus caffer aequinoctialis Blyth, Proc. Zool. soc. London, 1866, p. 372. 

 Bubalus azrakensis Matschie, Sitzb. Ges. naturf. freunde, Berlin, 1906, p. 169. 



In his review of the African buffaloes Matschie describes Bubalus 

 azrakensis as a new species; it is based upon an imperfect skull from 

 Roseires on the Blue Nile. He says that it belongs to those forms in 

 which the horn is strongly bowed downward and differs from all the 

 other species in that the inwardly bent tips of the horns turn suddenly 

 back at the ends. This appearance is sho\\Ti in his photographic 

 figure, in which, however, one of these tips is broken oflP. Moreover, 

 as the figure shows, the skull is that of an immature animal in which 

 the basal portions of the horns are unsolidified and have not been 

 preserved, although the spread is 84 cm., a fairly large size for Nile 

 Valley animals. The horns of three old bulls shot by Dr. Phillips 

 on the Dinder River, are heavy and massive, the bases very broad, 

 but not joining medially on the forehead, nor are they convex in this 

 region as in the caffer type, but flattened, ridged, and broadly exca- 

 vated. Their downward sweep reaches only about to the level of the 

 orbit and the tips are blunt and rather short, due in part to wear. 

 Cotton (1912) says that the horns of cows have a deeper curve than 

 those of the bulls and are not so wide. The long points, backwardly 

 turned, of Matschie's azrakensis seem more like an individual varia- 

 tion in an immature animal. In view of these facts, it does not appear 

 that the Buffalo of this region is satisfactorily distinguished from 

 aequinoctialis of the White Nile, so that it is best at present to use this 

 latter name to include the Buffalo of the Blue Nile as well. The 

 generic name Syncerus was revived in 1911 by Hollister to distinguish 

 the African Buffalo from the Water Buffalo — Bubalus. 



The following measurements of Dr. Phillips's specimens were made 

 in the field : — 



