480 MamMatia OF INDIA. 
much variation; sometimes they are absent or represented merely by a 
black callous skin; others are’ merely little knobs; the largest seldom 
exceed an inch and a-half, and the posterior horns five inches. 
S1ze.—Head and body, 40 to 42 inches; height at shoulder, 24 to 26 
inches; at croup a littie higher. 
This little antelope, the smallest of Indian hollow-horned ruminants, 
is very shy and difficult to get, even in jungles where it abounds. It 
was plentiful in the Seonee district, yet I seldom came across it, and 
was long before I secured a pair of live ones for my collection. It 
frequents, according to my experience, bamboo jungle ; but, according to 
Kinloch, Jerdon and other writers, it is found in jungly hills and open 
glades, in the forests, and in bushy ground near dense forests. 
It isan awkward-looking creature in action, as it runs with its neck 
stuck out in a poky sort of way, making short leaps; in walking it 
trips along on the tips of its toes like the little mouse-deer (Aeminna). 
The young are stated to be born in the cold season. General Hard- 
wicke created great confusion for a time by applying the name c/zkara, 
which is that of the Gazel/a Bennettii, to this species. It is not good 
eating, but can be improved by being well larded with mutton fat when 
roasted. McMaster believes in the individuality of Elliot’s antelope (7- 
sub-quadricornutus), Dut more evidence is required before it can be 
separated from gwadricornis. ‘The mere variation in size, or the pre- 
sence or absence of the anterior horns and the lighter shade of colour, 
are not sufficient reasons for its separation as a species, for the guadri- 
cornis is subject to variation in like manner.* 
BOVINA!K—CATTLE. 
These comprise the oxen, and wind up the hollow-horned ruminants 
as far as India is concerned. There are in the New World some other 
very interesting animals of this group, such as the musk-ox (Ovzos), 
and the prong-horned antelope (Aztlocapra), which last so far resem- 
bles the Cervidee that the horns, which are bifurcate, are also annually 
shed. ‘They come off the bony core, on which the new horn is already 
beginning to form. 
The Bovines are animals of large size, horned in both sexes, a very 
large and broad moist muffle, massive bodies and stout legs. The 
horns, which are laterally wide spread, are supported on cores of cellular 
bone, and are cylindrical or depressed at the base. The nose broad, 
with the nostrils at the side. The skull has no sub-orbital pit or fissure, 
and the bony orbit is prominent; grinders with a well-developed sup 
plementary lobe ; cannon bone short. In India, the groups into which 
* See notes in Appendix C, p. 529, 
