Bovine Animals of Scandinavia. 423 



to him. Hence we may conclude that the Urus and Bison never 

 lived together in the same tracts ; perhaps seldom in the same 

 forest. 



Having thus, from the fossil bones which are found in our 

 post- pliocene strata, given a short account of the Wild Ox, which 

 with us is now extinct, it remains to speak of our tame horned 

 cattle, of which several perceptibly different races occur with us ; 

 and, as far as we are able, to indicate from which wild species 

 each tame race chiefly derives its origin. These investigations 

 are however rendered particularly difficult by the circumstance, 

 that the tame races by crossings are so mingled, that their ori- 

 ginal stock is sometimes scarcely to be recognised. 



As a beginning we may notice, that it is solely from the di- 

 vision of the Ox family which have a flat forehead with the horn- 

 cores sitting at the extremity of the edge between the forehead 

 and the nape, that our tame cattle spring ; and that the ox with 

 a convex forehead, the Bison, which no one could ever make to 

 pair with a tame cow, has not in the least contributed to the 

 formation of any tame cattle. Besides, we can take for a given 

 and general rule, that the tame race is always less than the wild 

 species from which it springs. 



We believe we come nearest to the truth in this difficult sub- 

 ject, if we assume — 



1. That the large-sized lowland races, with flat foreheads, and 

 for the most part large horns, descend from the Urus (Bos pri- 

 migenius) and at length came into the country with a race of 

 people who immigrated from the south and west. 



2. The somewhat small-growth highland races, with high oc- 

 ciput and small or no horns, descend from the High-necked Ox 

 (Bos fi-ontosus) . 



3. How far the small-grown hornless Finn ko race (Noring, 

 pp. 213-229) descends from the Dwarf Ox (Bos longifrons, 

 Owen), may be more fully determined through future investiga- 

 tions. 



Notices of the Wild Oxen of Britain in the Historians of the 

 Middle Ages. 



In the third volume of the ' Annals,' p. 356, will be found, besides 

 the notice from a MS. record communicated by Sir P. Grey Eger- 

 ton, a passage also from the Lives of the Abbots of St. Albans by 

 Matthew Paris, in which he mentions the wild cattle of the forests 

 of the Chiltern district. To these may be added the following : — 



Fitzstephen, whose Descriptio nobilissimce civitatis Londunia; was 

 written about the year 1174, thus describes the country beyond the 

 suburbs : " Proxime patet ingens foresta, saltus nemorosi, ferarum 

 latebrae, cervorum, damarum, aprorum, et taurorum sylvestrium." 



