144 RUMINANTIA. 



dividuals. The males are polygamous. The female goes 

 with young five months, producing two at a birth. 



Is found in the most elevated parts of the Islands of Sar- 

 dinia and Corsica, in the province of Murcia in Spain, and 

 in some of the Greek islands, including Cyprus, accord- 

 ing to Desmarest. 



Genus BOS. 



Six grinding teeth in each jaw on each side. Horns per- 

 sistent, hollow, growing on a bony core ; body thick and 

 heavy ; tail long, terminated by a tuft of hair ; no tear- 

 furrows ; teats four in number. 



Bos Urus. 



Bos Urus, Desm. Mamm. Sp. 747 ; Schinz, Europ. Faun. vol. i. p. 89 ; 



Keyseeling und Blasids, Wirbelth. Europ. 

 The Aurochs. 



DESCErpTiosr. — Horns short, thick, polished, inchning out- 

 wards ; forehead arched, broader than it is high ; the occi- 

 pital crest projecting behind the base of the horns ; teats 

 arranged in a square, not in a single line, as in the Buffalo 

 and Yak ; the neck is thick and short, a hump or boss on 

 the shoulders, which, with the head and breast, are co- 

 vered with long curled hair ; beneath the throat is a long 

 pendent beard ; tail long, but shorter than in the domestic 

 breeds, with a tuft of hair at its extremity. General 

 colour of the body dark brown, or almost black. 



Length of head and body, 10 feet 3 inches ; height at 

 shoulders, 6 feet ; length of horns, 1 foot ; tail, without the 

 hairs, 2 feet. 



The Aurochs is not now known to exist in any other 

 part of Europe than Lithuania, where it is very strictly 

 protected by the Government. In 1846 several herds in- 

 habited the great forest of Bielowrza in the government 



