MUSK-OX. 
52 
continent as far as Melville Island, in latitude 15°, but they do not extend 
to Greenland, Lapland, or Spitzbergen. There is an extensive tract of 
barren country skirting the banks of the Mackenzie river, northwest of the 
Rocky Mountains, which also is inhabited by the Musk-Ox ; it is not 
known in New Caledonia, on the banks of the Columbia, nor in any 
portion of the Rocky Mountains ; nor does it cross over to the Asiatic 
shore : consequently it does not exist in any part of northern Asia or 
Siberia. 
Captain Parry noticed its appearance on Melville Island in the month 
of May ; it must therefore be regarded as an animal the native home of 
which is within the Arctic Circle, the dwelling-place of the Esquimaux. 
GENERAL REMARKS. 
The Musk-Ox is remarkable amongst the animals of America, for never 
having had more than one specific appellation, whilst other species of much 
less interest'have been honoured with a long list of synonymes. Jeremie 
appears to have given the first notice of it : he brought some of the wool 
to France, and had stockings made of it which were said to have been 
more beautiful than silk. The English voyagers of an early period gave 
some information respecting it, but Pennant has the merit of being the 
first who systematically arranged and described it, from the skin of a 
specimen sent to England by Hearne, the celebrated traveller. From its 
want of a naked muzzle and some other peculiarities, M. Blainville placed 
it in a genus intermediate (as its name denotes) between the sheep and 
the ox. 
