RUMINATING QUADRUPEDS. 147 



twixt this opening and its lungs, it has heen suggested to be more 

 likely for the purpose of rendering its hearing more acute. The 

 horns of the female are smaller than those of the male, and less bent 

 at the tip. The face is whitish yellow, with two stripes of black on 

 each side. The eyes are round and sparkling. During summer 

 the hair which covers the body is close and short, like that of the 

 stag ; during winter it is thicker and longer than that of the goat. 

 The color of the hair alters according to the seasons; in spring it 

 is of a cinereous grey, in summer of a rufous brown, in autumn of 

 a fawn color mixed with black, and in winter of a blackish brown. 



The chamois species are very particular in the choice of 

 food. They feed on the best herbage, and select the most deli- 

 cate part of the plants, flowers, and tender buds. They have 

 a particular fondness for the most aromatic mountain herbs, espe- 

 cially the carlini and genipi. In winter they yield to the hard law 

 of necessity; they scrape away the snow to get at the reindeer- 

 moss, and browse on the saplings of pine and fir. When they 

 feed on succulent herbage they drink very little, and they rumi- 

 nate during the intervals of feeding. 



These animals are of a gentle disposition ; they are vigilant 

 and gregarious; they occupy the crags of mountains in flocks 

 varying in number from four to a hundred ; they live from twenty 

 to thirty years; they prefer the morning and evening for their 

 times of pasture, when the herbs are rendered more refreshing by 

 the dewdrops which rest upon them. It is truly remarkable with 

 what ease, and even seeming indifference, they run along the rocks, 

 leaping from one to another, so as to defy the pursuit of dogs 

 Am those precipices, which to other quadrupeds appear inacces- 

 sible, they will climb and descend with as much ease and comfort, 

 as if they were bounding in their flight over a level plain. They 

 can throw themselves down thirty feet of a rock, and alight on 

 some small projecting fragment, just large enough to support their 

 feet. Their limbs are peculiarly made for this arduous exercise, 

 and their hind legs are so formed as to break the fall in alighting. 



The Ibex is found in several parts of Europe and Asia, as 

 in the Alps, the Pyrenees, Carpathian Mountains, Mount Tr uris, 



