CHAPTER XIV 



THE BUFFALO (BVBALVS) 



THE genus Bos is the most useful to mankind. The bull has been 

 from time immemorial venerated as an emblem of procreative power. 

 The winged bulls of Nineveh are now stored in that grand asylum 

 of the ancient world, the British Museum ; and we look back to 

 the earliest history in Egypt, where we see the bull-calf Apis sacred, 

 as symbolical of strength and procreativeness, that should supply 

 mankind with the herds of cattle necessary for their existence. 



The veneration for the bull was so firmly implanted in the human 

 mind, that we read of the first symptoms of antagonism to the 

 teaching of Moses, in Exodus, when the Hebrews sought the 

 assistance of Aaron to mould them a bull-calf in imitation of the 

 Egyptian Apis, directly that their leader and deliverer had dis- 

 appeared for a few days to seek the counsel of the Lord upon 

 Mount Sinai. 



In the savage regions of Central Africa, where the worship of a 

 Deity is unknown, the bull is regarded with a respect that is not 

 bestowed upon any other animal. Vast strength, the perfection of 

 masculine vigour, and indomitable courage, form the combination 

 which has attracted the adoration of mankind. 



This genus Bos is distributed in immense variety throughout the 

 globe, but in Africa we find an extraordinary anomaly, that although 

 domestic cattle (the generally accepted Bos) are omnipresent, even 

 among those savages who have been until recent years entirely 

 excluded from the world's history, there is no such creature ex- 

 isting in its wild state, and we are at a loss to discover a progenitor. 

 We know three varieties ifpon the African continent, but these 

 belong specially to the Jinljalus, and are distinct from the ordinary 

 wild cattle (1$. (<iurus) of Europe or other countries. 



The African buffalo, or fins differ, has two varieties, in which 

 the distinction is only to be found in the horns. No. 1 are convex, 



