234 ANIMALS OF THE 



of the pasture, and small as the animal is stinted 

 in its food. Thus Africa is remarkable for the 

 largest and the smallest cattle of this kind ; as 

 is also India, Poland, Switzerland, and several 

 other parts of Europe. Among the Eluth Tar- 

 tars, where the pastures are remarkably rich and 

 nourishing, the cow becomes so large, that he 

 must be a tall man who can reach the tip of its 

 shoulder. On the contrary, in France, where the 

 animal is stinted in its food, and driven from the 

 most flourishing pastures, it greatly degenerates. 

 But the differences in the size of this animal 

 are not so remarkable as those which are found in 

 its form, its hair, and its horns. The difference 

 is so very extraordinary in many of them, that 

 they have been even considered as a different 

 kind of creature, and names have been given 

 them as a distinct species, when in reality they 

 are all the same.* In this manner, the urus and 

 the bison have been considered, from the variety 

 in their make, to be distinct in their production ; 

 but they are all in fact the descendants of one 

 common stock, as they have that certain mark of 

 unity, they breed and propagate among each 

 other. Naturalists have therefore laboured under 

 an obvious error, when, because of the extreme 

 bulk of the urus, or because of the hump upon 

 the back of the bison, they assigned them dif- 

 ferent places in the creation, and separated a class 

 of animals which was really united. It is true, 

 the horse and the ass do not differ so much in 



* Buffon, vol. xxiii. p. 78. 



