30S On the Origin and Natural History 



Cuvier, as exhibited in the recent edition of the Regno Ani- 

 mal (1829). 



2. — The Domestic Bull and Cow. 

 (Bos Taurus, Pliny, Gesneb. Aedrovandus. Bos Taurus, domesticiu, 



LlNS.ECS, &C.) 



The most permanent and substantial specific characters of 

 this animal may be stated as follows : — Forehead flat, longer 

 than broad, horns round, placed at the two extremities of a 

 projecting line, which separates the front from the occiput. 

 Ribs amounting to thirteen pair. Teats disposed in the form 

 of a square. Hair of the anterior parts of the body not more 

 bushy than that of the other parts. The supposed original of 

 this animal (the urus of the ancients) is most probably extinct 

 in the living state. In the fossils skulls which appear to 

 represent it, the horns are curved forwards and downwards, 

 but in the countless varieties of the domestic breed, these parts 

 are very different in their forms- and direction, and are some- 

 times wanting altogether. The ordinary races of the torrid 

 zone are generally distinguished by a hump or large excre- 

 scence of fat and flesh upon the shoulders, The species does 

 not occur naturally in either North or South America. 



2.— The Aurochs of the Germans. 



(Called Zubr in Poland. Bos Urus of Gmelin. The Bison of (he ancients. 

 The European Bison of Shaw, Gen. Zool. pi. 205. Bos Taurus, var. Urus, 

 Linn. Bceuf Aurochs, Desmarest.) 



This species has been frequently, though erroneously, re- 

 garded as the origin of our donestic cattle. It is distinguish- 

 ed by its bulged or convex forehead, which is, moreover, 

 broader than high, by the peculiar attachment of the horns 

 below the line of the occipital ridge, by an additional pair of 

 ribs (fourteen), by a sort of frizzled wool, which covers the 

 head and neck of the male, and forms, as it were, a beard or 

 small mane upon the throat, and by a peculiarity in the tone 

 and utterance of its voice, which, to use the convenient 

 language of the novelist, is " more easily imagined than des- 

 cribed." This is a wild and independent animal, which is now 

 confined to the marshy forests of Lithuania, of Carpathia, and 

 the Caucasus, but formerly inhabited the temperate parts of 

 Europe. It is the largest of all the quadrupeds native to 

 Europe, and measures six feet in height at the shoulder, and 

 betwixt ten and eleven feet in length, from the nose to the 

 insertion of the tail. According to Gilibert, it surpasses the 

 dimensions of the lajgest of the Hungarian bulls. The length 

 of the mane in the female is not more than the fourth part of 

 that of the male. In both sexes, the lips, gums, palate, and 

 tongue, are blue, and the last mentioned part is very rough and 

 tuberculated. The horns are black, and thicker and more 

 compact than in the domestic bull. Certain parts of the hide 



