MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 241 



No. VIII.— NOTES ON THE GAUR {BOS GAURUS). 



In September 1905 Mr. Aylmer Martin delivered a lecture before the 

 members of the High Range Natural History Society on the Gaur {Bos 

 gaurus). Mr. Martin has kindly forwarded the MS. of this lecture to us 

 and has allowed us to make extracts from it. 



Writing of the colour of the head and body Mr. Martin says : — 



" As regards colour, the hair on the forehead and frontal ridge of a 

 specimen we had alive under almost daily observation at Sothapara for 

 4|- months was slaty grey, black down the front and sides of the face ; 

 the muzzle large and dark slately grey in colour. The greatest spread of 

 the horns of this specimen was 34|- inches. 



There are many different shades of colour in a bison's horns, at the base 

 a dull slate, giving way, a little further up, to a yellowish tint, which again 

 turns into a dull greenish colour, getting darker towards the tips, which are 

 always quite black. The ears are larger in proportion to the head than 

 those of domestic oxen, and black outside, the rich yellow skin of the 

 inside showing through ridges of black hair. The eye has been much 

 discussed and has mostly been described from dead beasts. The Sotha- 

 para specimen we were careful to make note of, the iris of his eye was a 

 mottled light brown, and pupils a slaty blue. 



He stood 16 hands 1-| inches at the shoulder. His body colour slatey 

 grey on the dorsal ridge deepening through shades of brown to intense 

 black on the sides and shoulders, coiTee-brown on the hind quarters, turning 

 gradually to black on the flanks. The hoofs were white, and the legs 

 white from 2 inches above the knees and hocks outside and from 1 inch 

 above the knees and hocks on the inside of his legs. 



The h-air inside the thighs and armpits was a bright chesnut. The neck 

 was black and had a large dewlap hanging down to a little below the level 

 of his knees. I give this description from notes I took from the live 

 mature animal at the time, and having since examined several bison shot 

 by myself and others I find that it is accurate enough to pass for them all. 

 Nevertheless, it contradicts in important particulars the description given 

 by many well known authorities." 



In regard to the presence and absence of dewlap, colour of eye, &c., about 

 which there has froiix time to time been much discussion, Mr. Martin 

 writes: — 



"Sanderson wrote in 1879 his ' Thirteen years among the Wild Beasts 

 of India,' a charming work full of truth and beauty ; he is silent on the 

 dewlap question, but differs from my description in other respects. 

 Mr. Edward Kindersley, who has shot bison on these hills and elsewhere, 

 wrote in November 1893 to the Nilf/iii Neios — ^ I have never to my know- 

 ledge shot a deivlapped bison,' while Mr. A. W. Turner, whose knowledge 

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