6366 Notice of the various 



India, Arabia, great part of Africa, even Madagascar, and would ap- 

 pear to be found so far eastward as Japan ; at least old Kcempfer tells 

 us that the Japanese " have a sort of large buffles, of monstrous size, 

 with bunches on the back, like camels, which serve for carriage and 

 transport of goods only in large cities." The name " buffalo," we may 

 here remark, is currently bestowed on the humped cattle by English 

 graziers ; and thus we commonly hear of " buffalo's hump," whereas a 

 buffalo does not happen to have a hump ! The extensive herds of the 

 Foulahs, Fellahs or Felatahs, pre-eminently a race of herdsmen, who 

 spread quite across Africa northward of the equator, consist exclusively 

 of these humped cattle. According to Denham's 'Appendix,' " two 

 kinds exist in Central Africa, one with a hump before and very small 

 horns ; the other altogether of a larger size, also with a hump, and 

 immense horns." The latter (of which we have seen a pair sent by 

 Denham to the British Museum) are enormously thick at base, but 

 exhibit the true and peculiar flexure of the species; and again the 

 Galla cattle, mentioned by Bruce and Salt, with immensely long and 

 proportionately thick horns, are humped, and not unlike some big- 

 horned cattle we remember noticing at Madras.* In Madagascar 

 there is a wild humpless race or species, long ago indicated by Fla- 

 court, and since noticed by the missionary Ellis, but the domestic 

 cattle of the island are stated to be all humped, and such are com- 

 monly imported thence for the markets of Mauritius and Bourbon. 

 These humped cattle are particularly suited to a dry and torrid climate, 

 are indifferent to the fiercest rays of the sun, seldom seek shade, and 

 never go into the water and there stand knee- or belly-deep for hours, 

 like the humpless cattle of Europe. Being unknown in a primitive 

 wild state, most naturalists still regard them as a mere climatal 

 variety of the Bos Taurus, especially as the two interbreed freely, and 

 the hybrids in every proportion; but there are other instances of spe- 

 cies thus commingling. The presence of the hump is but one 

 difference of very many ; and it and other distinctions are well shown 

 even in the small foetus. The one is born with teeth through the 

 gums, the other not so ! The whole form is indeed remarkably 

 different. In B. gibbosus the body is shorter and rounder, and the 

 hind-quarters slope abruptly, instead of being continued straight to 

 form nearly a right angle; the limbs are longer and more neatly 

 formed ; the ears lanceolate and somewhat pointed, instead of being 

 broad and rounded ; the dewlap begins at the chin, instead of before 



* Vide also the figures of cattle in some of BaruYs plates. 



