96 
and set off with black. A short hog-mane on the nape, but no tuft on the 
throat. 
Young male. Like the female in colour. 
Measurements of an adult male skull :—Basal length 16°3 inches, greatest 
breadth 5°75, muzzle to orbit 10, horn 8°5. 
Horns usually from 8 to 9 inches long, with a basal girth of about 8 inches, 
and rarely reaching a length of 11°75 inches, with a basal girth of 9°5. 
Hab. 'The Peninsula of India from the base of the Himalayas to the south 
of Mysore ; North-west Provinces, Eastern Punjab, Guzerat, and the Konkan ; 
but not extending to the Indus on the west, nor into Eastern Bengal, nor 
into Malabar. Entirely absent from the countries to the east of the Bay of 
Bengal. 
The Asiatic division of the Tragelaphine group, which, in the existing 
stage of the Earth’s fauna, is represented only by the present species, is 
nearly as different in its structure as it is in its geographical range from its 
African brethren, being at once distinguishable by its short hind limbs, 
untwisted horns, bovine nose, and hypsodont molars, not to mention its very 
different style of colour. The Asiatic form might, in fact, be more naturally 
arranged as constituting a Subfamily of itself, but we are content to follow 
recent authorities who have associated this animal with the more typical 
Tragelaphs of Africa. 
The ‘ Nilgai” (said by some authorities to be more correctly written 
“Nilgau,” from nil or lil, blue, and gau, cow) was first introduced into 
scientific literature by Pallas in his memoir on the genus Antilope published 
in 1766. Pallas’s “ Antilope tragocamelus,” as he called this species, was 
based partly upon Ray, who quoted from Gesner, and partly on the description 
of Dr. James Parsons, F.R.S., who, in the forty-third volume of the ‘ Philo- 
sophical Transactions,’ published in 1745, gave a very fair description of this 
animal from a living male specimen “ brought,” as he tells us, “from Bengal, 
and shown in London.” ‘There can be no doubt as to the identity of Parsons’s 
“ Quadruped,” whatever we may say regarding the less accurate descriptions 
of Ray and Gesner, and it follows, consequently, that “ tragocamelus” must 
be used as the earliest and most correct specific name of the Nilgai. 
In the supplement to his memoir on the genus Anéilope published in 1777, 
