110 GILPIX — 3X T[IE MAMMALIA OF NOVA SCOTIA. 



lumbar vertebra being very long. The tail is small and deeply hidden 

 betwixt the buttocks, which are slender and very cervine in their appear- 

 ance. The hocks are flat but of great depth surmounting a cannon bone 

 of great length. The brisket is of great depth, supported by a very 

 pov^erful fore arm, which however has its muscle unlike the horse on its 

 posterior rather than anterior surface ; the hoofs are small and polished, 

 the animal standing on the tips with the hind tips well off the ground. 

 The neck from the fore shoulder to the head is clothed by a dense coat 

 of hair, which forms a mane from the chest along the neck to the chin, 

 hidden in which and depending from betv,'ixt the angle of the jaws hangs 

 the " bell," a species of wattle, coniposcd of muscle and skin, and cover- 

 ed with long hair resembling the brush of a fox. The eye is dark with 

 little expression and set deep in its bony socket. The color of this bull 

 was in the highest summer coating of deep glossy black, and short as a 

 well groomed horse. The moufle and forehead liad a brownish-yellow 

 cast, the cheeks and neck dark balck ; the ears were light fawn inside,, a 

 little darker outside, the crest yellowish mixed grey and white, and a 

 yellow grey patch upon the croup. The inside of the buttocks and all 

 the legs both inside and outside Avere bright yellow fawn, the black of the 

 body running down half way, to the hocks and to the knees, and ending 

 with an abrupt line in a point. There vvas also a black line running 

 from each hock and each knee in front, and widening to join the hoof. 

 This lice has heretofore escaped observers. Captain Hardy doubts 

 it, and I can only maintain that it was so in this instance. We have 

 but few opportunities of seeing the summer coating. It v/as recognized 

 by the Indian chief James Meuse when 1 showed him my sketches, and 

 I have iitle doubt may always be found. The winter coating is formed 

 of long hair so stiff as to stand bristly outward, and as each hair is lead 

 colored at base, greyisb.-white in the middle, and black at tip, the whole 

 animal has a greyish appearance. The crest loses its yellowish wash, 

 and the hair on the cheeks and neck is both darker and shaggier than on 

 the body. There is still a yellowish brown wash upon the moufle, and 

 forehead, and the ears are brownish fawn. The beautiful yellow fawn 

 and black stripes of the legs disappear, and mixed grey cover them, 

 hiding tlie abrupt lines of black and tan. This is the usual color as 

 described by naturalists as he is usually taken in winter, when the bulls 

 are hornles-s, the cow.s having none. In the bull calf of the first year two 

 knobs swell out upon the forehead beneath the skin ; in the second year 

 the true horn appears, a single prong six or eight inches long ; in the 

 third year the new horn is usually trifingered, and a little flattened ; and 

 in the fourth year assumes the adult form though small. The Indian 

 and hunters say they increase till the eighth year. The horn of an adult 

 bull springs at right angles from a broad knobby base on the forehead, 

 throws off one, two, or three brow prongs on tines and then rapidly flat- 

 tening reflects backwards nearly at right angles, forming a broad flattened 

 palm, the anterior convex edge of which is subdivided into more or less 

 numerous tines. There is some analogy between the number of these tines 

 and the age of the owner, but not accurate enough for calculation. About 

 seven or eight tines are the usual number. The largest pair of liom^ I 



