ITS NEAREST EXISTING RELATIONS. 



87 



Linn.), which is nearly as widely diffused and use- 

 ful to man as the horse, was for long a matter of 

 uncertainty. It was known and used in Egypt long 

 before the horse, and the general belief that it was 



FIG. 11. African Wild Ass (Equus asinus) and foal. 



From a photograph by Major J. F. Nott of animals living in the Zoological 

 Society^ Gardens. 



first domesticated in that land has been confirmed 

 by the discovery of a wild ass in Abyssinia and other 

 parts of the districts of north-eastern Africa lying 

 between the Nile and the Red Sea which so closely 



