1875. WILD GOAT OF ASIA MINOR. 467 
I made many inquiries among the native hunters; and they all 
agreed in saying that the horns were never so used, or for any purpose 
except fighting ; and the result of my own observations is, that during 
the leap the head is carried as far back as possible, though it may 
be that the situations in which I observed the animals did not neces- 
sitate the employment of the horns in the way referred to. 
The flesh of the wild goat is very good, tastes very much like 
venison, and has none of the unpleasant characteristics of the tame 
species. It is much esteemed among the Turks; and Belon relates 
(Paulus, Reisen in den Orient, Th. iv. p. 27), that the Greeks of 
Crete were accustomed to bake the Ibex whole, and that he fre- 
quently saw such entire dried animals hanging up in the mountain- 
huts. The skin is in request for praying-mats and a variety of pur- 
poses, while of the horns are made powder-flasks, drinking-cups, 
and even ramrods. 
Most naturalists agree in considering the C. egagrus to be the 
principal original stock of the ordinary domestic goats, while some 
go so far as to say that all our varieties are derived from it. 
Berchem, however, considered the Aigagrus itself to be a variety of 
the Ibex, which he believes to be the real original stock of the tame 
breeds (‘ Betracht. u. d. wild. Ursprung d. Hausziegen,”” Hoepfners 
Mag. 1718, Bd. ii.) and (‘ Beschr. d. Nat. d. Steinbocks, d. Savoy. 
Alp.,” 16.1789, Bd. iv.). Sundevall thought that C.falconeri, Hugel, 
from Cashmere and Thibet, approached nearer to the domestic goat 
than C. egagrus. 
Giebel (Allgem. Zool. pt. i. p. 29) says that the certainty of C. 
e@gagrus being the origin of the domestic goat is not based upon suf- 
ficient grounds. Mr. Hutton, in his interesting paper (Calc. Journ. 
vol. ii.), seems to hold the same opinion. He has tried in vain to 
procure a breed from two hybrids ; and in crosses got from a hybrid by 
domestic goats he finds that the beard, which he says is possessed by 
the female of the Persian and Afghanistan tame breeds, is retained to 
the third generation ; and arguing from the tendency of tame animals, 
when crossed by the wild stock, to return to their original condition, 
he says, ‘‘1f the domestic breed is derived from the wild one, the fermer 
one being crossed by the original stock should revert to it, and the 
tendency to do this would appear in the absence of those peculiarities 
which were unnatural. Yet this is not the case; for although the 
beard is unnatural in the wild female, yet the half-breed and even 
the third generation of the cross retain it, thus showing it to be a na- 
tural characteristic in the tame goat, and that the breeds are distinct.” 
I may remark that in a tame female goat which I examined the other 
day, and which was said to be of a pure breed, the hair was short and 
the ground-colour and markings almost identical with those of the 
/Egagrus, but the horns were absent, and the beard was present. 
Belon (Bemerk.; see Paulus, Reisen, Th.iv.) states that the Wild Goat 
of Crete breeds freely with the tame; and many hybrids have been 
produced in the Gardens of the Society by a female obtained in that 
island, which crossed freely both with the domestic breeds and with 
the Markhore (C. megaceros). According to Guldenstadt (Pen- 
30* 
