CHAPTER IX 



THE TAKIN (Biidorcas bedfordi) 



THE takin is a strange beast inhabiting a strange 

 country. No animal that I have ever seen is so 

 difficult to describe, and none of the rare accounts 

 which I have read in the least prepared me for 

 his appearance. In this, an age of big game 

 hunting, probably no creature in the world save 

 his congener, the musk ox, has so seldom been 

 an object of pursuit by the white man. Some 

 years ago Professor A. Milne Edwards suggested 

 an affinity between the latter animal and the 

 Budorcas. The two genera were subsequently 

 placed in juxtaposition by the late Professor Riiti- 

 meyer. Dr. Matschie developed the idea, and 

 regards them as forming a sub-family by them- 

 selves the ovibovinse. As indications of their 

 mutual affinity he notices the short and broad 

 front cannon bones, the structure of the skull and 

 form of the horns, the small ears, the hairy muzzle, 

 the short tail, the clumsy main hoofs, and the 

 large size of the lateral pair. 



Mr. Blanford has placed Budorcas in the neigh- 

 bourhood of the serows (nemorhcedus), and with 

 this view Mr. Lydekker agrees. 



The takin has, in China, been killed by few 



