104 Mr. "R. I. Pocock on some 



B. indicuft aiul B. tmiriis lias been frequenlly arlvanced as 

 evidence of tlieir specific (listiiictnes.^. To this I shall refer 

 Inter (p. lOb'). If there is any truth in the claim, the nruu- 

 ment dispose.^ of the theory of llie banteng descent of the 

 zebu. The voice of the zebu I liave described below. It 

 differs considerably from that of the banteng, which I have 

 heard described as a roar or bellow. Perhaps Blanford^s 

 phraseology applied to the voice of the gaur will convey as 

 good an idea of it as any. He said it is " a prolonged call, 

 not ver}' unlike the lowing of Bos taurus, but utterly unlike 

 that of B. indlcnsy Blanford, however, seems to have been 

 unacquainted with the true call of the zebu {cf. infra, p. 109). 

 In my opinion, the voice of the zebu differs at least as much 

 from the voice of the banteng as it does from that of 

 B. taurus ; but for reasons given below I do not think this 

 necessaril}' disproves the theory of the descent of the zebu 

 from the banteng. 



The evidence derived by RUtime3'er from the form of the 

 skull in the banteng and zebu is rendered, in my opinion, 

 untrustworthy by the extraordinai'y variability of the skull 

 in domesticated' cattle. In any case, the cranial resemblances 

 between the two are not close, as a comparison between Ly- 

 dekker's figure of the skull of a bull Gujrati zebu (published 

 on pi. XX. of his volume on the Ox) with his figures of the 

 skulls of the Javan and Bornean banteng (published on 

 Pl*. 24&26of his ' (Catalogue of Ungulates ' in 1913) will show. 

 The banteng-sknlls, indeed, have a relatively longer forehead 

 and shorter face, and thus approximate to the typical taurine 

 type. Nevertheless, the' skull is so plastic that I should 

 liesitate to take it as a reliable guide to affinity, one way or 

 the other, where domesticated animals are concerned (c/. 

 infra^ p. 106). 



One other point may be referred to. In both the gayal 

 and the banteng, representing two distinct species of the 

 Bihos group of cattle, the urethral canal of the penis ends in a 

 small pointed process, free from the swollen termination of 

 the glans. In the zebu there is no such process, the urethral 

 canal terminating, as in tyitical Bos, on the underside of tlie 

 swollen end of the glans (Ann. &, Mag. Nat. Hist. (9) ii. 

 pp. 451, 454-455, 1918). 



III. The Charactees of Bos inbicvs and Bos taubtis. 



The principal differences between an average Indian zebu 

 and an average British or Spanish fighting bull are well 

 known. The zebu has a hump of fleshy and fatty tissue on 



