18 AUROCHS AND WISENT CHAP. 
ios) 
og 
slightly through domestication. It is, however, said not to cross 
in a state of nature with the Gaur.' 
Fic, 166.—Gayal. Bos frontalis. x 
The Banteng, B. sondaicus, is distributed through Chittagong, 
Tenasserim, and the Malay Peninsula to Java and Borneo. There 
are apparently two races of this animal. The species differs from 
the others by the fact that the horns are smaller and more curved ; 
there is a white caudal disc; the forehead is narrower and the 
skull longer than in the others. 
The American Bison and the European Aurochs form another 
section ; they are indeed extremely alike, specific differences being 
hardly recognisable. The Bison of America, formerly present in 
such numbers that the prairies were black with countless herds, 
has now diminished to about a thousand head. 
One of the largest of existing Bovidae is the Aurochs, Wisent, or 
European Bison, Bos bonasus (or Bison europaeus). It is exceedingly 
like its American relative. Formerly the animal was much more 
widely spread than it is now, extending its range from Europe into 
North America. It is now limited to certain districts on the Urals, 
in the Caucasus, and a herd of them are kept up through the 
fostering care of the Emperor of Russia in the forest of Bielovege 
in Lithuania. The term “ Aurochs” should not really be applied to 
this species but to the Wild Cattle, Bos taurus. It is, however, so 
cenerally used for the Wisent (which is the German name) that it 
1 See Proc. Zool. Soc. 1890, p. 592. 
