Читать книгу Essay on the Theory of the Earth онлайн

54 страница из 122

The Ethiopian Boar of Agatharchides, which is described as having horns, is precisely the Ethiopian Boar of modern times, the enormous tusks of which deserve the name of horns nearly as much as those of the elephant[39].

The Bubalus and Nagor are described by Pliny[40]; the Gazelle by Ælian[41]; the Oryx by Oppian[42]; the Axis, so early as the time of Ctesias[43]; and the Algazel, and Corinne, are accurately figured upon the Egyptian monuments[44].

Ælian has well described the Bos grunniens or Yak, under the name of the ox having a tail which serves for a fly-flapper[45].

The Buffalo was not domesticated by the ancients; but the Indian Ox, of which Ælian speaks[46], and which had horns large enough to hold three amphoræ, was assuredly that variety of the buffalo which is now called the arnee. And even the wild ox with depressed horns, which is mentioned by Aristotle as inhabiting Arachosia, a province of ancient Persia, could be nothing else than the common buffalo[47].

The ancients were acquainted with the hornless variety of the ox[48], and with the African oxen, whose horns, being only attached to the skin, moved with it[49]. They also knew the Indian oxen, which equalled the horse in speed[50]; and those which were so small as not to exceed a he-goat in size[51]. Nor were the broad-tailed sheep unknown to them[52],—nor those of India, which were said to be as large as asses[53].