1837.] 



The Indian Antelope, 



409 



habits of the Antelope tribe. He stated, however, that it was evident 

 from this table, that there is no relation between the gregarious habits 

 of the Antelopes which frequent the plains, and the presence of the subor- 

 bital and maxillary sinuses; since these, besides being altogether want- 

 ing in some of the gregarious species, are present in many of the solitary 

 frequenters of rocky mountainous districts. The supposition, therefore, 

 that the secretion may serve, when left on shrubs or stones, to direct a 

 Straggler to the general herd, falls to the ground. 



Mr. Ogilby remarked, with reference to this subject, that he had had 

 opportunities of observing, at the Surrey Zoological Gardens, a female 

 of the Indian Antelope, in which, when he first saw her, the lacrymal 

 sinus was in a state of quiescence : but when he observed her again, a 

 month afterwards, and probably in improved condition, that organ was 

 in a state as excitable as it is in the old male of the Society's Gardens. 



He added, as a general remark, which, however, he stated was not 

 universal, that in intertropical animals the lacrymal sinus is larger than 

 in more northern species, and in those whose range is limited to moun- 

 tainous districts. 



He also described the lacrymal sinus of a species of Gazelle, which he 

 had observed after death: it consisted of a gland furnished with six ex- 

 cretory ducts placed nearly in a circle, and with one central duct : from 

 the orifices of these ducts, when squeezed, there issued out strings of a 

 dense ceruminous matter. 



Mr. Bennett stated in conclusion, that since making his observations 

 on the Indian Antelope, which haa led him to form the o pinion he had 

 advanced with respect to the use of the lacrymal sinus, he had received 

 from Mr. Hodgson of Nepal, a Corresponding Member of the Society, a 

 letter in which, among other subjects, some remarks are made on this 

 organ as it exists in the Thar Arilelope, and in the Cervus Aristotelis ; 

 in the former of those animals, Mr. Hodgson's observations prove that 

 during the breeding-season the lacrymal sinus is in a h igh state of ac- 

 tivity. Mr. Hodgson's letter, which is dated Nepal, June 18, 1835, 

 refers also to other glands in some other Antelopes, as will be seen by 

 the following extract. 



" The Chiru Antelope has exceedingly large inguinal sacs, which 

 hang by a long narrow neck from the loins. The longitudinal quasi 

 maxillary gland of the Cambin Otan I doubt the existence of, and be- 

 lieve its * suborbital sinus' to be similar to that of Thar. 



" The latter differs essentially from that organ in any Deer or Ante- 

 lope 1 have seen ; being furnished with a huge gland, filling the whole 

 cavity or depression on the scull, and leaving the cuticular fold void of 

 hollowness : it is filled up, like the bony depression, by the gland j 



