146 BANDA OMENTAL, [chap, viil 



teeth, their short heads, and upturned nostrils give them the 

 most ludicrous self-confident air of defiance imaginable. 



Since my return, I have procured a skeleton head, through 

 the kindness of my friend Captain Sulivan, R.N., which is now 

 deposited in the College of Surgeons.* Don F. Muniz, of 

 Luxan, has kindly collected for me all the information which he 

 could respecting this breed. From his account it seems that 

 about eighty or ninety years ago, they were rare and kept as 

 curiosities at Buenos Ayres. The breed is universally believed 

 to have originated amongst the Indians southward of the Plata ; 

 and that it was with them the commonest kind. Even to this 

 day, those reared in the provinces near the Plata show their less 

 civilized origin, in being fiercer than common cattle, and in the 

 cow easily deserting her first calf, if visited too often or molested. 

 It is a singular fact that an almost similar structure to the ab- 

 normal f one of the niata breed, characterizes, as I am informed 

 by Dr. Falconer, that great extinct ruminant of India, the Siva- 

 therium. The breed is very true ; and a niata bull and cow 

 invariably produce niata calves. A niata bull with a common 

 cow, or the reverse cross, produces offspring having an interme- 

 diate character, but with the niata characters strongly displayed : 

 according to Senor Muniz, there is the clearest evidence, con- 

 trary to the common belief of agriculturists in analogous cases, 

 that the niata cow when crossed with a common bull transmits 

 her peculiarities more strongly than the niata bull when crossed 

 with a common cow. When the pasture is tolerably long, the 

 niata cattle feed with the tongue and palate as well as common 

 cattle ; but during the great droughts, when so many animals 

 perish, the niata breed is under a great disadvantage, and would 

 be exterminated if not attended to ; for the common cattle, like 

 horses, are able just to keep alive, by browsing with their lips 01: 

 twigs of trees and reeds ; this the niatas cannot so well do, as . 

 their lips do not join, and hence they are found to perish before 

 the common cattle. This strikes me as a good illustration of 

 how little we are able to judge from the ordinary habits of life, 



* Mr. Waterhouse lias drawn up a detailed description of this head, 

 which I hope he will publish in some Journal. 



f A nearly similar abnormal, but I do not know whether hereditary, struc- 

 ture has been observed in the carp, and likewise in the crocodile of the 

 Ganges: HJstoire des Anomalies, par M. Isid. GeofFroy St. Hilaire, torn. 1. 

 p. 24 I. 



