Description of Gaur. 137 



horns, pale greenish with black tips curving outwards, 

 upwards, and slightly backwards, and finally inwards. 

 General colour, dark chestnut brown, or coffee brown ; 

 legs, from knee downwards, a dirty white. The above 

 description is from Jerdon, and is very exact as 

 applied to the Indian gaur. The Burmese differ in 

 the following respects : The head is longer ; the nose 

 arched like a ram's (some of the Indian ones have this 

 too, but in a less degree) ; the dorsal ridge is more 

 prominent and extends much further backwards, to 

 within a short span of the loin or hip-joint. Whereas 

 in India a bull of nineteen hands is considered very large, 

 cows in Burma have been killed at that height, and 

 an old bull is often twenty- one hands and more. 

 The cows in India differ from the bulls in having 

 slighter and more graceful heads, while those in 

 Burma have longer heads with the noses more arched 

 than the bulls. The necks are slighter, there is no 

 hump, and the points of the horns do not turn 

 towards each other at the tips, but bend slightly 

 backward and are much smaller. The legs too, are of 

 a purer white. Whilst in the Indian cows the bony 

 frontal ridge is scarcely perceptible, it is most promi- 

 nent in the Burmese ones. All gaur have very 

 small feet for their size, not much bigger than those 

 of a large sambur. The old bulls have the bases of 

 the horns much truncated with rough ridges, and each 

 ridge, the " shikaries " assert, represents a year of its 

 life, after six years of age, before which they are not 

 apparent. If correct in this, I have shot gaur over 

 thirty years of age. The skin of an old specimen 

 exudes an oily substance, slightly offensive. Never 

 sit on a dead one, for this substance will cause a stain 



