580 On Bos Gaums. [No. 115. 



morin to the Himalayas, should only have been indicated distinctly, 

 within the last two years. I have seen specimens from Tinnevelly, 

 and liliewise from the whole range of the Syhadree mountains up to 

 Mahableshwar, and T know that the animal has been killed near Vel- 

 lore, in the Sherwaroyah hills near Salem^ at Aseergurh, in Kandes, 

 Rajamundry, and I doubt not that it will likewise be found in all the 

 deeper recesses of the eastern Ghauts, and on the banks of all the great 

 rivers passing through them. An imperfect cranium, which seems to 

 belong to a female of this species, in the United Service Museum, is 

 labelled thus " Head of a Bison from Kuddah, Straits of Malacca, 

 presented by Lieutenant- Colonel Frith, Madras Artillery." 



The following memoranda were made in 1833 in the southern Mah- 

 ratta country, at a time when I had frequent opportunities of seeing 

 the animal. " It is called Gaviya by the Mahrattas, Jungli khoolga 

 and Urna by the Mahommedans, (though it has not the slightest affi- 

 nity with the buffalo, to which both of these names apply), and Karkona 

 by the Canarese, which is of similar import, from Kadu, a forest, and 

 Kona, a buffalo. 



It differs also very remarkably from the common ox, and though it 

 approaches considerably more to the descriptions of the bison, the name 

 generally applied to it by English sportsmen, it exhibits marked 

 structural differences, excluding it from the Bisontine group as defined 

 by Cuvier. These consist in the plane of the fore-head being " flat 

 and even slightly concave," and in the possession of only 13 pair of 

 ribs. It is not improbable that it will be found to constitute a con- 

 necting link between the Bisontine* and Taurine groups. The most 

 remarkable characters in the animal are an arched coronal, or convex 

 bony ridge, surmounting the frontal bone, and projecting beyond it so as 

 to make the line from the vertex to the orbit a concave sweep ; the 

 continuation of which from the orbit to the muzzle is slightly convex. 

 The other distinctive mark is the prolongation of the spinous proces- 

 ses of the vertebrae of the back, from the withers to the loins where 

 they cease abruptly. These processes are 12f in number, and their pro- 

 longation gives the animal a very extraordinary appearance. 



* One prime character of scull is enormous massiveness, three time that of the Ox's 

 scull— B. H. H. 



t 13, or same as the ribs. — B. H. H. 



