1868.] 411 [Hayes. 



goats, does not hesitate to declare, that "all the characters of this 

 species seem to indicate that it is the source of the beautiful and pre- 

 cious Angora goat whose horns are spirally turned like those of Fal- 

 coner's goat." M. Brandt intimates that the domestication of other 

 wild species than C. cegragus and perhaps the C. FaJconeri had 

 produced the Angora goat. Geoffroy St. Hilaire,the highest authority 

 upon the origin of domestic animals, refer.s to the opinions of M. Sacc 

 and M. Brandt without dissent, thus: "he (M. Brandt) is led espe- 

 cially to see in the Angora goat, produced, according to Pallas, by the 

 cross of the sheep with the goat, an issue of the Capra Falconeri; this 

 opinion is also admitted by our learned confrere, M. Sacc." * 



The hypothesis that the Angora goat is descended from Falconer's 

 goat is rendered probable by the diffusion of the former around the 

 mountains of Thibet, where Falconer's goat abounds, and even be- 

 yond the central plains of Asia from Armenia to Chinese Tartary, 

 where its wool is manufactured, or exported in a natural state by the 

 port of Shanghae. Angora wool, or mohair, was exhibited at the Lon- 

 don Exhibition of 1862 among the Russian products, as proceeding 

 fi'om the country of the Kalmucks of the Don, situated between the 

 Black and Caspian Seas. This species is thus seen to be diffused, 

 although it may be sparingly, over the whole surface of Asia. 



That this goat is at present more abundant in the country about 

 Angora in Asia Minor, near the habitat of the Capra cpgragus nnd 

 distant many thousand miles from Thibet, may seem opj^osed to its 

 derivation from the Tliibetian species. The learned memoir of the 

 Russian traveller, M. TchiliatchefF, | establishes beyond cjuestion the 

 comparatively recent introduction of the Angora goat into Asia 

 Minor. He has shown that among the countries of classic antiquity 

 there is no one which the ancient writers have mentioned more fre- 

 quently and under more varied aspects than Asia Minor, because this 

 country was not only one of the foci of the Greek civilization, but 

 also the native country of a great number of the most celebrated 

 writere of antiquity, such as Herodotus, Homer, Strabo, Dion of 

 Halicaruassus, Galen, etc. Hence in all that concerns the natural 

 history of Asia Minor, the writings of these authors have an especial 

 interest, while their silence has the value of a negative argument. 

 Referring to the -vvi-itings anterior to the classic period, we find in 

 the mc»st ancient and venerable of historic monuments, the Bible, 

 that the goat is frequently mentioned among the domestic animals 

 which constituted the riches of the first patriarchs. Yet there is 

 nothing in these notices which leads us to suppose that they Avere 



*Sur les origines des anlmaux domestiques. Bulletin supr. cit., T. vi., p. 503. 

 t Considerations sur la cli6vre d'Angora. Bulletin supr. cit., T. ii., p. 411. 



