OTHER DOMESTICATED CATTLE 179 
cept for its white legs, normally a dark-coloured 
animal, many individuals are pied, while others arc 
wholly white. In England, at any rate, gayal have 
bred with zebu, a fact which may in some degree 
tend to strengthen the view of the affinity of the 
latter to the bantin-gaur group. 
The next species on the list is the Indian buffalo, 
which to many of the native tribes of India is the 
most important of all domesticated animals, this 
being notably the case among the Todas of the 
Nilgiri Hills of Madras, by whom enormous herds 
are maintained for the sake of their milk and butter. 
Large herds are likewise maintained in many districts 
by the tribes living on the flanks of the Himalaya, 
where they are tended by half- wild gujars, or herds- 
men. In many parts of the plains buffaloes are, 
however, mainly employed in agricultural operations, 
and as beasts of burden. Although buffalo-milk is 
very rich and nourishing, it has a thick, ropy consist- 
ence, a yellow colour, and a peculiar taste, decidedly 
unpleasant to most European palates. Buffalo cows 
give more milk than ordinary European cows, and 
the buffalo ox is as well adapted for labour as the 
ox of Europe. In Italy a highly esteemed cheese, 
known in Naples as inuzzarello, is made from buffalo- 
rnilk (see p. 145). 
Domesticated buffaloes are the descendants — fre- 
quently but little altered in form and other characters 
— from the huge wild buffalo {J^os bulmlis) of the great 
and tall grass-jungles of Assam and certain other 
parts of India, which has a shoulder-height of at least 
six feet. Two distinct types of horns are met with 
in the arna, or wild Indian buffalo, those of one 
type curving regularly upwards and outwards and 
