96 WILD LIFE IN NORTH CANARA. 



follows that they attain at least the 

 age of fifteen years. 



The dorsal ridge in fu|l-grown bulls 

 makes the measurement both of height 

 and girth reach rather startling figures. 

 I have myself assisted at the death of 

 a bull bison which, as he lay dead, 

 measured nineteen hands from the point 

 of the hoof to the top of the wither ; 

 his girth behind the shoulder and over 

 the wither was nine feet some inches. 

 This bull was shot at Gairsappa, on 

 the ridge overhanging the precipitous 

 ravine (a thousand feet deep) into which 

 the river plunges. My companion 

 who was on the ridge crippled the 

 bison by a bullet in the shoulder, and I 

 ascended the bare hill-side from a val- 

 ley below to cut ofi" his retreat; when 



