EAE nr ae ne eee CTE, F 
No he 
Mr. E. Blyth on the different Animals known as Wild Asses. 235 
While identifying the Kyang with the Dshiggitai, however, 
Professor Walker little imagined that he was making the same 
mistake that he considered M. Frédéric Cuvier and others to 
have done, in referring the Ghor-khur also to Z. hemionus. I 
find that the Ghor-khur accords to the minutest particular with 
the Koulan or E. onager of Pallas, figured by Professor Gmelin 
from an occasional variety bearing a short humeral stripe (which 
is not rare also in Indian specimens of either sex*), from the 
presence of which the identity of this animal with the true Ass 
has been generally, but erroneously, inferred. Of the two indi- 
viduals then at St. Petersburg, which are described by Professor 
Gmelin, it may be remarked that his male only had the shoulder- 
stripe, and his female not a trace of it; and he was informed 
that individuals had been seen with a second shoulder-stripe. 
This I have myself observed in the domestic Ass, and even a 
third and fourth, more or less developed—the additional ones 
being of variable length, and given off along the back as far as 
the loins,—though it is very rarely that more than a single stripe 
occurs, and I have seen only one domestic Ass without the 
shoulder-stripe. Many of our Indian donkeys have also well- 
defined transverse bars on the limbs, which are permanent for 
life (not, as described by Professor T. Bell, peculiar to the foal) ; 
they are often black and strongly contrasting, placed rather 
distantly apart, and they vary much in length. It is remark- 
able that some races of horses also have the same markings. 
The well-known “eel-back dun” of England is so named from 
its black dorsal stripe bearing a supposed resemblance to an 
eel; the Indian Kattyawar (or rather, Cutch Horse) has gene- 
rally, in addition, the shoulder-stripe and Zebra-markings on the 
limbs black and very distinct and conspicuous; and the same 
may be observed of many of the Shan ponies from the indepen- 
dent states north of Burma, many of which are brought annually 
to Maulmein, and not a few thence to Calcutta. I have seen 
one of these, of the pale drab colour usual in the Ass, with the 
cross and the stripes on the limbs deep black and most conspi- 
cuous, the dorsal stripe being continued down the tail just as in 
the Asinine series; yet in all other respects it was a handsome 
robust pony, with copious equine mane and tail, showing no 
approximation whatever to the Asinine group in its structure or 
voice. Those who believe that the domestic Horse is a com- 
pound species derived from a plurality of aboriginal races may 
* Jacquemont notices such a specimen, which he saw in Barrackpore 
Park (Voyage dans l’Inde, i. 170; vide also Journ. Asiat. Soc. xxvi. 240). 
In Pallas’s ‘ Zoographia Rosso-Asiatica,’ which I have seen since penning 
the above, there is a coloured figure of E. onager, but much too rufous in 
the particular copy to accord with the description. 
16* 
