OEDEE OP PACflYDEEMATA. 223 



The resemblance whicli exists between the Ass and the Zebra 

 suggested the idea tbat a cross migbt easily be made between 

 them. Mules between the Zebra and the Ass were obtained 

 in England in the time of BufFon, and, at the present day, mules 

 between the Zebra and the Horse. 



The Zebra was not unknown to the ancients, who called it 

 Hippo-tigris, that is Horse-tiger. An historian relates that the 

 Emperor Caracalla killed on a certain day, in one of the circus 

 combats, an Elephant, a Rhinoceros, a Tiger, and a Hippo-tigris. 

 Diodorus of Sicily speaks of the Hippo-tigris, although in rather 

 obscure terms. 



The kings of Persia, during certain religious festivals, were 

 accustomed to sacrifice Zebras to the sun, a stock of which were 

 kept by these potentates in some of the islands of the Red Sea. 



Quagga. — The Quagga is smaller than the Zebra, and more 

 resembles the Horse in general shape. His head is small, and 

 his ears are short. The colour of head, neck, and shoulders is a 

 dark brown, verging on black ; the back and the flanks are of a 

 bright brown, which on the croup merges into .a russet grey. The 

 upper parts of the legs and tail are crossed with whitish bars, the 

 underneath parts are white. The tail is terminated by a tuft of 

 long hair. It is a native of the plateaux of Caifraria, and feeds 

 on grasses and the Mimosa shrub, and lives in droves indiscrimi- 

 nately with the Zebra. It is tamed without difficulty. The 

 Dutch colonists were in the habit of keeping them with their 

 herds, which they defended against the Hyenas. If one of these 

 formidable carnivora threatened to attack the cattle, the domes- 

 ticated Quagga would attack and beat down the enemy with its 

 fore-hoofs, ultimately trampling it to death. 



The menagerie of the Museum of Natural History in Paris has 

 for some time been in possession of a male Quagga. At the sight 

 of Horses or Asses, this animal woidd several times utter a shrill 

 cry, which might be pretty nearly expressed by the word Coua-ag ! 

 Dauw or Peetsi {Equus BurcheUii, Bennett). — The Dauw seems 

 to take a middle place between the Zebra and the Quagga. It 

 resembles the former in its shape and proportions, and the latter 

 in the colour of its coat, which is dun on the upper and white 

 on the underneath portions of the body. All the upper parts are 

 streaked with dark bands, which are transverse in front and oblic[ue 



