EXISTING KINDS OF WILD CATTLE 239 
ascertained. This buffalo {B. caffer cottoni) is of 
rather large size ; and in respect of colouring forms 
a step in the direction of the small orange-red 
Ashanti race, although the horns are to a great 
extent miniatures of those of the black Cape buffalo, 
except that they do not apparently meet at their 
bases. 
An apparently very similar buffalo is met with on 
the opposite side of the great equatorial forest in the 
interior of French Congo. In the head of a young 
bull of this buffalo in the British Museum the colour 
of the hair is darker than in an Ashanti specimen of 
B. c. nanus, its general tint being tawny brown, 
tending to blackish on the muzzle and chin. But the 
most characteristic feature is the colour of the thick 
fringe of long hair on the ears. At the base of the 
upper edge these hairs are light yellowish chestnut ; 
but on the rest of this margin, and also on the lower 
edge, they are black, with two small flecks of straw- 
colour near the middle of the lower border, and a 
larger patch near the base. 
In the autumn of 1900 I saw the head of an adult, 
although not old, bull from the same region, in which 
the colour of the hair was bright red, while the 
horns were of the general type of those of the Cape 
buffalo, although smaller, and separated by a con- 
siderable interval at the base. Whether the bulls of 
these buffaloes turn blackish when older, I have no 
information. If they do, the French Congo buffalo 
may be identical with the one from the Semliki ; but 
if not, it must be distinct. 
In the Field newspaper for 1910^ I gave a notice 
of certain buffalo-heads obtained by Mr. M. W. Hilton- 
^ Vol. cxv. p. 156. 
