ITS NEAREST EXISTING RELATIONS 81 



largest and the darkest in colour, being of a rufous bay, 

 and more approaches the horse in general appearance. 

 It inhabits the high table-lands of Thibet, where it is 

 usually met with at an elevation of 15,000 feet and 

 upwards. Smaller, and paler in colour, being some- 

 times almost silvery- white, is the onager (JE. onager, 

 Pall.), from Persia, the Punjab, Scinde, and the Desert 

 of Outch. Differing but slightly, if at all, from this, is 

 the Syrian wild ass, described by Geoffroy under the 

 name of JEqims hemippus. These three all closely re- 

 semble each other in their habits, and are all remark- 

 ably swift of foot, having been known to outstrip the 

 fleetest horse in speed. None of them have ever been 

 domesticated. 



The origin of the domestic ass (Eqiius asinus, Linn.), 

 which is nearly as widely diffused and useful to man as 

 the horse, was for long a matter of uncertainty. It was 

 known and used in Egypt long before the horse, and the 

 general belief that it was first domesticated in that land 

 has been confirmed by the discovery of a wild ass in 

 Abyssinia and other parts of the districts of North- 

 eastern Africa lying between the Nile and the Red Sea 

 which so closely resembles certain breeds of the well- 

 known domestic animal as to leave little doubt as to their 

 identity. This has been called Equus tceniopus (band- 

 or stripe-footed) by Heuglin, on account of the frequent 

 presence of black, transverse markings upon the lower 



G 



