138 
serve to prove that at an earlier epoch of 
the earth’s history thei range was much 
more extensive. Their general colour—sandy 
in summer and dirty white in winter— 
harmonises admirably with thew natural 
surroundings; and to protect them from the 
piercing winter cold of them native steppes, 
salgas at that season are clad in a fur coat 
of great thickness and warmth. 
Wa 
“A stTILL more effective ‘motoring-coat’ is 
donned all the year round by 
the Musk-Ox, although the 
winter garb, the remains of 
which are seen hanging in ragged flakes in 
And 
Another. 
GREENLAND MUSK-OX (Ovibos 
From the specimen (a male) lately living at Woburn Park. 
the present photograph, is thicker and more 
shaggy than that of summer. When the 
accompanying photograph was taken—in the 
early part of last summer or late spring—the 
animal looked fit and thriving. Unfortunately 
it did not lone survive, and there is at the 
present time no living specimen of its kind 
in the kingdom. When first received at 
Woburn Abbey a few years ago, this musk-ox 
was a tiny little creature without trace of 
horns. Together with a comrade whose 
tenure of life in captivity was of the shortest, 
it was brought from Clavering Island, on the 
Animal Life 
east coast of Greenland, and during the 
greater part of its sojourn at Woburn grew 
with great rapidity. At the time of its death 
the bases of the horns had met im the middle 
line of the forehead, although they would 
have increased somewhat in vertical depth 
had the creature lived longer. 
“The Greenland Musk-Ox (Ovibos moschatus 
wardt) represents a race apart from the typical 
Canadian animal, being distinguished, among 
other features, by the presence of a certain 
amount of white on the forehead. Musk- 
oxen, like saigas, were once found in Britain, 
although not perhaps at the same time, their 
occupancy haying taken place when a large 
portion of 
our islands 
was covered 
with an ice- 
sheet like 
that of their 
native home. 
Despite the 
thickness 
of its coat, 
the Woburn 
musk-ox 
seemed by 
no means un- 
comfortable 
or out of 
health during 
the summer 
(and we had 
at least one 
real summer 
during its 
sojourn). Its 
hoofs grew, however, to an unnatural and 
inconvenient length, although the ground of 
its yard was strewn with rough stones. It 
may be, indeed, that these stones were too 
rough and rugged for a glacier-haunting 
anunal, and that rounded ones would have 
been better. Anyway, if another specimen 
be received, it might be well to try the 
effect of hustling it round its enclosure in 
the hope of keeping its hoofs shorter. The 
great length of the hair of the under-parts 
of the musk-ox, 1t may be observed, is doubt- 
less for the purpose of protecting the vital 
moschatus). 
