390 



MAMMALIA — ox. 



There can be little doubt that the zebu, or Indian ox, is merely a variety 

 of the common ox, although it is difficult to ascertain the causes by which 

 the distinctive characters of the two races have been in the process of time 

 gradually produced. But whatever the causes may have been, their effects 

 rapidly disappear by the intermixture of the breeds, and are entirely lost at 

 the end of a fev/ generations. This intermixture and its results Avould 



alone furnish a sufficient proof of identity of origin ; which consequently 

 scarcely requires the confirmation to be derived from the perfect agreement 

 of their internal structure, and of all the more essential particulars of their 

 external conformation. These, however, are not wanting ; not only is 

 their anatomical structure the same, but the form of their heads, which 

 affords the only certain means of distinguishing the actual species of this 

 genus from each other, presents no difference whatever. In both the fore- 

 head is flat, or more properly slightly depressed ; nearly square in its 

 outlines, its height being equal to its breadth; and bounded above by a 

 prominent line, forming an angular protuberance, passing directly across 

 the skull between the basis of the horns. The only circumstances, in fact, 

 in which the two animals differ, consist in a fatty hump on the shoulders of 

 the zebu, and in the somewhat more slender and delicate make of its legs. 



Numerous breeds of this humped variety, varying in size from that of a 

 large mastiff dog, to that of a full grown buffalo, are spread, more or less 

 extensively, over the whole of southern Asia, the islands of the Indian 

 Archipelago, and the eastern coast of Africa, from Abyssinia to the Cape 

 of Good Hope. In all these countries, the zebu supplies the place of the 



