48 ^ ZOOLOGY OF INDIA. 



culty •withdrawn from the enraged animal, who stood in 

 terrific exultation over the torn limb, and for some time 

 would suffer no one to approach it. 



If we may judge from the close and efficient covering of 

 fur with which, except towards the termination of the rut- 

 ting-season, both the camel and dromedary are clothed, we 

 should infer that these anunals came originally from a tem- 

 perate climate, where, as in the central parts of Asia, a 

 considerable degree of cold was at times experienced. The 

 coat appears to become scanty only in such individuals as 

 reside in very hot regions, and this circumstance is regarded 

 by Major Smith as a fair indication that their primitive 

 habitat was in a region occasionally subjected to a pretty 

 severe temperature. The southern base of the Caucasian 

 mountains has been assigned to what is named the Arabian 

 species or dromedary ; and the arid plains beneath the 

 northern confines of the Paropamisaden range, with the 

 wilderness of Jasnak and Chorasmia, east of the Caspian, 

 may perhaps be regarded as among the native abodes of the 

 camel or Bactrian species. Something to this effect may 

 be inferred from scattered hints in the Zend, the poems of 

 Schah, named Ferdusi, and in the Arabian epic, the romance 

 of Antar.* The articles used in manufactures, and known 

 under the names of mohair and camlets, are the produce 

 of the fur of these animals. 



The musk-deer (genus Moschus) are the only other tribe 

 which we include among the hornless ruminants of Asia. 

 Of these the musk-deer, far excellence {M. moschifenis), is 

 one of the most remarkable. Although the drug called 

 musk has been known throughout Central Asia from time 

 immemorial, it does not appear that the animal which pro- 

 duced it was known to the ancients, or indeed in any way 

 identified till it was described by Abuzeid Scrassi, an Ara- 

 bian author, who stated that it was a deer without horns. 

 A knowledge of it was first introduced in Western Europe 

 by Serapion, who flourished in the eighth century. It is 

 nearly the size of a roebuck, with an exceedingly short 

 tail, and covered by a very coarse coat. Its native regions 

 are the alpine tracts of Central Asia, where it dwells amid 

 barren rocks and perpetual snows, descending occasionally 



* Griffith's Animal Kingdom, vol. iv. p. 46. 



