118 THE FOREST AND THE FIELD. 



varieties, the gooral, surrow, and ibex; and the 

 latter two the burrul and thaar. 



The musk deer, or kustooree, a solitary animal, 

 is about the size of a roebuck, measuring forty- 

 inches in length and twenty-two in height. The 

 male is furnished with a sharp-pointed canine 

 tooth, or tusk, curving backwards on each side of 

 the upper jaw, which in a full-grown animal is 

 about three inches in length. The general colour 

 is speckled gray, approaching to black on the 

 shoulders, back, and outside of the legs ; reddish 

 fawn along the lower part of the sides and inside 

 the thighs, and dirty white under the throat and 

 belly and inside the legs. The fur is very thick, 

 coarse, and brittle, the hairs being nearly white 

 at the roots, and becoming gradually darker 

 towards the end, not unlike the small under-quills 

 of the porcupine. The head is delicately formed, 

 the ears broad and erect, and the tail very small, 

 not being over an inch in length. In males this 

 appendage is quite naked, except a small tuft at 

 the end caused by continued shaking about ; but 

 in females and young it remains covered with 



