THE BISONS. 



119 



lowered, their points were on either side of me, 

 and the muzzle of the gun barely touched his fore- 

 head when I pulled the trigger, and three shillings' 

 worth of small change rattled into his hard head. 

 Down he went, and rolled over with the suddenly 

 checked momentum of his charge. Away went 

 B. and I as fast as our heels would carry us through 

 the water and over the plain, knowing that he was 

 not dead but only stunned. There was a large 



fallen tree about half a mile from us, whose whitened 

 branches, rising high above the ground, offered a 

 tempting asylum. To this we directed our flying 

 steps, and after a run of a hundred yards we turned 

 and looked behind us. He had regained his feet 

 and was following us slowly. . . . 



" On he came, but fortunately so stunned by the 

 collision with her Majesty's features upon the coin 

 which he had dared to oppose that he could only 



Fig. 193. — The Kerabau Buffalo (Bubalus Kerabau). 



reel forward at a slow canter. By degrees even 

 this pace slackened, and he fell." — Sir Samuel 

 Baker, Rifle and Hound in Ceylon.] 



Fig. 193 gives an illustration of the Kerabau 

 Buffalo (Bubalus Kerabau) as a representative 

 of this group with flattened horns. This 

 animal is a native of the Eastern Archipelago 

 from Celebes to the Philippines. In size it 

 is equal to the largest buffaloes of the Kaffir 

 country. The head is rather long and slender, 

 the muffle is broad, the body long and plump, 

 the dewlap only slightly developed, the colos- 

 sal flattened horns have well-marked rings 

 and are gently curved first outwards and 

 then backwards. In a wild state this animal 

 lives, like other buffaloes, in morasses; when 

 tamed it is very gentle and tractable in the 

 hands of the natives, but ill-tempered and 

 dangerous towards Europeans. It is em- 



ployed like other buffaloes as a beast of 

 draught and burden. Specimens of it have 

 been brought to Europe, and have been 

 paired with the common buffalo. 



The Bisons. 



The Bisons (Bison) likewise form a sepa- 

 rate group, the members of which are charac- 

 terized by their broad arched brow, their 

 small short horns, which are thick and bent 

 upwards, by their coat of long thick hair, and 

 by their height at the withers, which part 

 presents a marked contrast to the relatively 

 small hinder quarters. There are two species 

 of bisons, one of which lives in Europe and 

 Western Asia, and the other in America. 



The European Bison {Bison etiropceus 

 (bonasus)), PI. XXXI., has at all times had the 

 singular fortune to be confounded with another 



