I860.] On the Flat-horned Taurine Cattle of S. E. Asia. 289 



but are more active, and very shy. The Raja of Bhojpur, and his 

 kinsman Sahebzadeh Singha [as of late Kumar Singha, the notable 

 rebel], carefully preserve them from injury ; and say, that owing to 

 the encroachments of agriculture the number is rapidly diminishing. 

 Many of their neighbours, however, alleged that the devastation 

 committed by these sacred herds was very ruinous, and every year 

 occasioned more and more land to be deserted. The origin of these 

 herds is well known. "When the Ujayani Rajputs incurred the dis- 

 pleasure of Kasim Ali, and for some years were compelled to 

 abandon their habitations, some cattle were left in the woods without 

 keepers ; and on their owner's return had acquired the wild habits, 

 which their offspring retain. Several calves had been caught ; but 

 it has been found impossible to rear them, their shyness and regret 

 for the loss of liberty having always proved fatal. This shows what 

 difficulties mankind must have encountered in first taming this most 

 useful animal," &c. &c. The extreme wildness of the feral cattle of 

 Oudh is noticed by Capt. (now Col. Sir T. Proby) Cautley, in 

 J. A. S. IX, 623. " In the districts of Akhurpur and Doolpur, in 

 the province of Oudh," he remarks, " large herds of black oxen are, 

 or were, to be found in the wild uncultivated tracts, a fact to which 

 I can bear testimony from my own personal observation, having, in 

 1820, come in contact with a very large herd of these beasts, of 

 which we were only fortunate enough to kill one ; their excessive 

 shyness and wildness preventing us from a near approach at any second 

 opportunity." Another writer notices herds of these feral humped 

 cattle on the road from Agra to Bareilly ; and, from all recent 

 accounts, they seem to be on the increase rather than on the 

 decrease.* 



and he thinks without the Isil-gai markings on the feet (which are often seen in 

 domestic liumped cattle). Whether the Oudh herds tend to uniformity of 

 colouring I am unaware. The feral herds of hurapless cattle in S. America are, 

 I believe, of various colours, like their domestic Spanish pragenitors. 



* In an article "On the Future of Oudh" (published in the Morning Chronicle 

 for ilay 17th, 1859), it is remarked that " The forests, and notably among them 

 that of the Tarai, towards Nipal, serve as a shelter for innumerable wild cattle, 

 which are admirably suited for artillery bullocks and other laborious purposes, 

 besides affording excellent fire-wood and pasture for cattle, and also hunting- 

 ground for the sportsman. In these forests, and in the estensive jungles, are to be 

 found the hides and horns of thousands of wild cattle, rotting, as it were, for want 

 of hands to turn them to account, and which alone would prove a most remunera- 

 tive branch of commerce, to judge from the success which the very few who 



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