224 



DESCRIPTION OF THE 



But having since obtained many individuals, alive, some of which 

 lived in confinement many months and even produced young, having been 

 enceinte when they reached me, I considered it my duty to keep memo- 

 randums of such traits of character and manners as I was enabled to 

 observe ; and, as I see no prospect of the task falling into abler hands, 

 I shall now record the substance of those memorandums, embodying them 

 in such a description of the essential characters, aspect and habits of this 

 most rare animal, as my small conversancy with the science will permit 

 me to give. 



To my description, I shall add drawings of the Budiisu and of his 

 skull, together with (for the sake of comparison), others of the Jackal and 

 Fox, and of their skulls. These drawings are upon an uniform scale, 

 reduced with the Camera, from others of the natural size ; and, in order to 

 be more precise, I shall in my description of the Sudnsu follow the 

 principle upon which the sketches have been executed ; that is, I shall 

 endeavour to illustrate my subject by constant reference to the Jackal, 

 and occasional reference to the Fox — animals which are, or ought to be, 

 sufficiently well known. 



Of all the wild animals that I know of similar size and habits, the 

 Buansu, which is large, gregarious, and noisy in his huntings, is the most 

 difficult to be met with. He tenants solely the deepest and most solitary 

 forests of this woody and little peopled region. The woods which cover 

 the mountains environing the valley of Nepal proper afford shelter to 

 numbers of Jackals as of other wild animals; but the Buansu never was 

 known to enter them, or, to approach so near to a populous district. This 

 prototype of the most familiar of all quadrupeds with man is, in the per- 

 fectly wild state, the most shy of his society, I never beheld the Buansu 

 myself in the state of freedom, and therefore what I am about to say of 



