250 
DESCRIPTION OF THE 
17 June, 
examining the animal before it was cut up ; this being the first of the 
species which I had seen. 
The name of buffalo^ presents another example of the misap- 
plication of European names to the wild animals of Southern Africa, 
and of the erroneous notions to which it gives rise. By those who 
are not read in zoology, the buffel or buffalo of the Cape, called by 
the Bichuanas Naari, is most frequently supposed to be the same 
with the animals which bear that name in Italy, Greece, and India, 
instead of a huge beast much more ferocious and dangerous, and 
which has never yet been tamed to the use of man. It is, however, 
an animal hitherto found no where but in the extratropical part of 
Southern Africa, and is widely distinct from every other species of the 
ox tribe, and most remarkable by its horns which, though not of more 
than ordinary or proportional length, are so unusually broad at their 
base as to cover the whole forehead, and give to it the appearance of 
a mass of rock ; an appearance to which the ruggedness and uneven- 
ness of their surface greatly contribute. Its countenance exhibits a 
savage and malevolent expression. Its bulk far exceeds that of the 
ox, although its height be not much greater ; but it is altogether 
more robust and strongly made. It is, when not young, but thinly 
covered with short scattered black hair ; that on the under lip and 
about the corners of the mouth, being longer and somewhat re- 
sembling a beard. The wither rises high, but not sufficiently to 
form a hump ; the tail resembles that of the common ox, but is 
much shorter, and the two spurious hoofs are rather larger in propor- 
tion. Its horns turn outwards and downwards ; and their points are 
recurved upwards. The hide is much thicker than that of the ox, 
and is valued by the Colonists and Hottentots, for its great strength, 
and for possessing the qualities proper for riefus and trektouws. It is 
of a fierce and treacherous disposition, which, added to its size and 
strength, renders it dangerous to be attacked without caution, or 
without the certain means of escape at hand. 
The true buffalo having been long domesticated and rendered a 
useful beast of draught or of burden, has suggested the possibility of 
taming this animal to the same purposes ; and the attempt has several 
