196 
THE SYRIAN HYRAX. 
never shewed any alteration of behaviour upon 
the presence of the bird, but treated it with a kind 
of absolute indifference. The cage, indeed, was 
large, and the birds having a perch to sit upon in 
the upper part of it, they did not annoy one 
another. 
“ In Amhara this animal is called Ashkoko, 
which, I apprehend, is derived from the singularity 
of those long herinaceous hairs, which, like small 
thorns, grow about his back, and which in Amhara 
are called Ashok. In Arabia and Syria he is 
called Israel’s Sheep, or Gannim Israel ; for what 
reason I know not, unless it be chiefly from his 
frequenting the rocks of Horeb and Sinai, where 
the children of Israel made their forty years pere- 
grination : perhaps this name obtains only among 
the Arabians. I apprehend he is known by that 
of Saphan in the Hebrew, and is the animal erro- 
neously called by our translators Cunieulus, the 
rabbit or coney.” 
To render the illustration of this very curious 
genus as complete as our limits will permit, we 
have introduced a figure of the species described 
by Pallas. 
