THE HORNED ANIMALS— GOATS. 



453 



compelled from motives of self-preservation to ac- 

 cept it, as it occurred on the edge of a precipice. 

 For a whole hour he had to struggle with the animal 

 before he subdued it. Besides these chivalrous ex- 

 ploits the buck was guilty of greater deeds of mis- 

 chief. He continued to be the terror of the goat- 

 herds, whom he frequently attacked and ill-treated, 

 coming down from the heights to visit their huts. 

 The people living on the mountains again began 

 handing in petitions to the government, and the con- 

 sequence was another removal of the buck. The 

 Grimselalpe was allotted to him; but there also he 

 evinced his old disposition; he picked quarrels with 

 all Dogs with which he came in contact, even with 

 the largest; and if they stood their ground he simply 

 threw them over his head, sending them through the 

 air in a bold curve. He defiantly put himself in the 



formation of its horns. The favorite haunts of the 

 Pyrenean Ibex are as inaccessible as those of the 

 Steinbock, and it is equally as difficult to hunt. 

 General Character- The Goats proper (Hircus) are, on an 

 istics of Domes- average, of a smaller size than the 



tic Goats. Ibex. The horns are more or less 

 compressed, those of the male having longitudinal 

 angular ridges or "keels," while those of both male 

 and female are marked by wrinkles or transverse 

 rings, each depression indicating a deposit of horny 

 matter acquired during the growth of the horn. In 

 all other respects the Goats resemble the Ibex. 

 Ancestry of the As is the case with the other domes- 



Domestic tic animals we do not know which 

 Goat. species of wild animals was the orig- 



inal progenitor of the domestic Goat. Our informa- 

 tion about the wild Goats, which are especiallv nu- 



THE JEGAGRUS GOAT. Thewild Goat, call* ! Paseng by the Persians. 



domestic breeds are descended. The long horns of the male, transversely ridged, ; 

 inhabits the remote heights of all Asiatic mountain ranges from the Caucasus to th 



proportionately longer than thos 

 imalayas. {Capra a gag/ us.) 



way of climbing travelers and spread terror and panic 

 wherever he appeared. So the government at last 

 was obliged to take extreme measures against him 

 and the freedom-loving, vigorous fellow was sen- 

 tenced to die. His offspring were distinguished by 

 a particularly savage disposition, which manifested 

 itself as they grew older. While they were young, 

 "they diverted the goatherds by their mischievous 

 pranks and antics; but when they grew older and 

 stronger, they became a burden to their owners and 

 were slaughtered, one and all. Such was the termi- 

 nation of the Bouquetin breeding at Berne, the in- 

 tended object being found impracticable, or if not 

 impracticable was certainly not achieved in this at- 

 tempt. 



The Ibex of the Pyrenees (Capra pyrenaica) attains 

 exactly the same dimensions as the Steinbock of the 

 Alps, but differs materially from it in the shape and 



merous in Asia, is so meager that we have no means 

 of forming even an approximate estimate of the 

 number of their species. Many naturalists believe 

 that to the /Egagrus more than any other wild spe- 

 cies of Goat is due the honor of having enriched us 

 with so useful a domestic animal. The ^Egagrus 

 and the domestic Goat are alike in all physical es- 

 sentials except in the direction and twist of their 

 horns. 



Description of the The /Egagrus or Paseng (Capra atgag- 

 /Egagrusor rus) is smaller than the European 

 Wild Goat. Bouquetin, but perceptibly larger 

 than the domestic Goat. The length of a full-grown 

 male is about five feet; the height at the shoulder 

 is thirty- eight inches and at the croup nearly 

 an inch more. The female is perceptibly smaller. 

 The horns are very large and strong, much com- 

 pressed laterally, sharp-edged in front and behind 



