The Animal World, A Book of Natural History Part 21

This animal lives in reedy swamps, and is generally found in herds, which often number from 250 to 300 individuals. They are very wary, and difficult to approach, while they are so swift of foot that only a very fast horse can escape from them when carrying a rider on its back. In charging they throw their heads back, with the horns upon the shoulders, and then suddenly bend down and strike upward when they come within reach.

The buffalo does not usually attack unless it is wounded, however, though solitaries will often lie in concealment and rush out upon the hunter as he pa.s.ses by.

THE INDIAN BUFFALO

There is another kind of buffalo found in India, which is a very different animal in every way. It is different in appearance, for it has its head drawn out into a kind of muzzle, while its horns are very long indeed, and taper gradually from base to tip, at the same time curving outward and upward and backward. And it is different in disposition, because it is easily tamed, and is employed in many parts of India as a beast of draught and burden. You might see buffaloes drawing a plow, for example, or dragging a cart, and for these and similar purposes they have been introduced into Egypt, and even into Southern Europe. The wild bulls, however, are apt to be very savage when they live alone. But a herd of buffaloes, strange to say, though they will gallop up close, and toss their heads, and behave in a most threatening manner, seem never to actually attack a man so long as he has the courage to stand perfectly still.

THE MUSK-OX

Though it is called an ox, and looks like an ox, this animal is in reality much more closely related to the sheep. It is of about the size of a rather large ram, but looks much bigger than it really is, owing to the great ma.s.ses of long hair, which cover the whole of its body, and hang down so far that one can scarcely see its legs at all. It is even more hairy than the yak.

The horns of the male animal are very curiously formed, for they are so broad and flat at the base that they form a kind of helmet, which covers almost the whole of the forehead. They then droop downward on either side of the face, but curve upward and outward at the tips. Those of the cow, however, are very much smaller.

The musk-ox lives in the most northerly parts of North America. It is perfectly at home amid the snow and ice, and lives in the wildest and dreariest regions, in which the ground scarcely thaws during the whole of the year; so that the life of those who hunt it is a very hard one.

But, as a rule, its only enemies are the arctic wolves, which drive it to bay on some rocky mountain slope, and tear it to the ground by the mere force of numbers.

The name of this animal is due to the musky flavor of its flesh, which is said to be very tender and delicate.

SHEEP

The sheep are represented at the present time by several wild species, one of which is found in Northern India east of the Indus, in the Punjab, and in Sind; one in North America; and another in North Africa.

The rest inhabit the high ground of Europe and Asia as far south as the Himalayas. These mountains, with the adjacent plateaus of the Pamirs and the great ranges of Central Asia, form the main home of the group. Wild sheep are of various types, some so much like the goats that it is difficult to draw a hard and fast line between them; while others, especially the curly-horned argalis, bighorns, urial, and Kamchatka wild sheep, are unmistakably of the sheep type.

The wild original of the domesticated breeds of sheep is unknown.

Domesticated sheep which live on hills and mountains are still inclined to seek the highest ground at night. The rams fight as the wild rams do, and many of them display activity and powers of climbing and of finding a living on barren ground scarcely less remarkable than in the wild races.

The domesticated sheep have been bred by artificial selection for unnumbered ages in order to produce wool. It is said that in some of the wild breeds there is an under-fur which will felt like wool. Most of the species are short-tailed animals, but this is not the case with the Barbary wild sheep. Wild sheep are mainly mountain-living animals or frequenters of high ground. They generally, though not always, frequent less rugged country than that of the wild goats, and some are found at quite low levels. The alt.i.tude at which other wild sheep are found is, however, very great; on the Pamirs it reaches twenty thousand feet. Here the country is quite open.

THE EUROPEAN MOUFLON

The only wild sheep of Europe is the mouflon, found in the mountains of Corsica and Sardinia. Its height at the shoulder is about twenty-seven inches. In the rams the horns are strong, and curved into a spiral, forming almost a complete circle. The hair is close, and in winter has a woolly under-fur. In summer and autumn the coat is a bright red brown on the neck, shoulders, and legs; the rump and under parts are whitish, and the back and flanks marked with a white saddle. In winter the brown becomes darker and the white saddle broader. A rather larger mouflon is found on the Elburz mountain range in Persia, in Armenia, and in the Taurus Mountains. A smaller variety exists in Cyprus, where it has been preserved since the British occupation. The mouflon is a typical wild sheep. In Sardinia and Corsica are dense scrubby forests of tall heather, some five feet high, practically impenetrable to hunters. When alarmed, the mouflon dash into this cover and are safe. These forests have preserved two very interesting survivals of antiquity--the mouflon, and the Corsican or Sardinian bandit. The Corsican bandit, like the mouflon of the same island, is nearly extinct. In Sardinia both still flourish.

THE ARGALI

This animal is found in Siberia and Mongolia, and also in Tibet. It is the largest of all living wild sheep, and is about as big as a large donkey, and has enormous twisted and wrinkled horns, which are sometimes as much as four feet long, and nineteen inches round at the base. The male Tibetan argali has a ruff on the throat. The usual color is a stony gray, mingled with white in summer in the case of the old males.

The argali rams are very fond of fighting one another, and such fierce conflicts take place that sometimes their horns are broken short off, and left lying upon the ground. And it will give you some idea of the size of these horns when we tell you that more than once a fox has been found lying fast asleep in one of them!

The argali is a mountain-loving animal, seldom seen at a lower level than twelve or thirteen thousand feet even in winter, while in summer it ascends much higher. It is a most difficult creature to approach, for it lives in small flocks, which always post a sentry to keep careful watch while they are feeding. At the slightest sign of danger the alert sentinel gives the alarm and a moment later the animals are dispersing in all directions, scrambling so actively over rocks and up and down precipices that is it quite impossible to follow them.

It has sometimes been said that when the argali leaps from a height it alights on its horns, which break the force of its fall. But this statement seems to be quite untrue.

Writing of the argali of Southern Siberia, the naturalist Brehm says that when the Tartars want mutton an argali-hunt is organized. The Tartar hunters advance on their horses at intervals of 200 or 300 yards, and when the sheep are started generally manage, by riding, shooting, coursing them with dogs, and shouting, to bewilder, shoot, or capture several.

THE GULJAR, OR MARCO POLO'S SHEEP

On the high plateau of the Pamirs and the adjacent districts Marco Polo's sheep is found. The rams are only slightly less in size than the Siberian argali; the hair is longer than in that species, and the horns are thinner and more slender and extend farther in an outward direction.

An adult ram may weigh three hundred pounds. The first description of this sheep was given by the old traveler whose name it now bears. He said that on the Pamir plateau wild animals were met with in large numbers, particularly a sheep of great size, having horns three, four, and even six palms in length; and that the shepherds (hunters?) formed ladles and vessels from them. In the Pamirs Marco Polo's sheep is seldom found at less than 11,000 or 12,000 feet above the sea. In the Tian-Shan Mountains it is said to descend to 2,000 or 3,000 feet. They prefer the hilly, gra.s.sy plains, and only seek the hills for safety. On the Pamirs they are said to be very numerous in places, one hunter stating that he saw in one day not less than six hundred head.

THE BIGHORN SHEEP OF AMERICA AND KAMCHATKA

North America has its parallel to the argalis in the famous bighorn. It is now very rare even in Northern Canada, and becoming scarce in the United States, though a few are found here and there at various points on the Rocky Mountains as far south as Mexico. In habits it is much the same as other wild sheep--that is to say, it haunts the rock-hills and "bad lands" near the mountains, feeding on the scanty herbage of the high ground, and not descending unless driven down by snow.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WILD SHEEP AND GOATS

1. Chamois. 2. Moufflon.

3. Argali. 4. Markhor.]

The bighorn sheep are very partial to salt. Mr. Turner, who hunted them in British Columbia, says: "Wild sheep make periodical excursions to the mountain-tops to gorge themselves with salty clay. They may remain from an hour to two days, and when killed their stomachs will be found full of nothing but the clay formed from denuded limestone, which they lick and gnaw until sometimes deep tunnels are formed in the cliffs, large enough to hide six or seven sheep. The hunter, standing over one of these warrens, may bolt them within two yards of him. In the dead of winter sheep often come to the woods to feed on fir-trees. At such times they may be seen mixed with black-and-white-tailed deer, low on a river-bank. I have known them come within forty yards of an inhabited hut."

Mr. H. C. Nelson tells us that once he was sleeping with two other friends in a hut in the mountains where some miners had lived for a time. These men, when they washed up their pots and pans, threw the slops away at a certain place close by the hut. As all water used for cooking meat has salt put into it, a little salt remained on the surface. This the wild sheep had found out, and were in the habit of coming to lick it at night.

The bighorn sheep stands from three feet two inches to three feet six inches at the shoulder. The horns are of the general type of the argalis, but smoother. Another bighorn is found in Kamchatka. There is also a beautiful white race of bighorn inhabiting Alaska. The typical Rocky Mountain race is browner than the Asiatic argalis, and in winter is dark even beneath the front parts of the body. It is not found on the high peaks of the great ranges, but on difficult though lower ground on the minor hills.

THE URIAL

The vast range of the Himalayas affords feeding-ground to other species of wild sheep and wild goat, so different in the shape of the horns that the variations of the sheep race under domestication need not be matter for wonder when so much variety is seen in nature.

The urial, or sha, is found in Northwest India, on the Trans-Indus Mountains, and in Ladak, Northern Tibet, Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Turkestan, and Southern Persia. The horns make a half-curve backward, and are flattened. The angle with the horizontal line across the ears is about half a right angle. The coat is of a reddish-gray color, with white on the belly, legs, and throat. This species has a very wide geographical distribution, and is the only wild sheep found in India proper.

THE AOUDAD, OR ARUI

This is a large wild type of the North African highlands. It stands intermediate between sheep and goats. The old rams have a very fine appearance, with a long flowing beard or mane, and large horns. These wild animals, though somewhat goat-like in appearance, are typical of the sheep race in general habits. They live in the Atlas Range, and in the splendid heights of the Aures Mountains, which lie at the back of Algeria and fringe the great Sahara Desert. In the isolated and burning rocks which jut up in the desert itself into single mountains they are also found, living on ground which seems absolutely dest.i.tute of water, gra.s.s, or vegetation. They live singly or in small families; but the rams keep mainly alone. Sometimes they lie in shallow caves during the heat of the day. These caves smell like a sheepfold. More generally the aoudad reposes on some shelf of rock, where it matches the color of the stone, and is almost invisible. The ground is one of the most difficult in which any hunting is attempted, except perhaps in chamois-stalking; but the pursuit seems to fascinate sportsmen.

Mr. A. E. Pease gives some charming descriptions of the silence, the rugged rocks, and the astonis.h.i.+ng views over the great orange Sahara Desert seen from the tops of these haunts of the aoudad--mountains on the summits of which his Arab guides would prostrate themselves in evening prayer as the sun sank over the desert, and then, rising, once more resume the chase. The young of the aoudad are charming little creatures, much like reddish kids. They can follow the mother over the steepest ground at a great pace. When caught, as they sometimes are by the Arabs, they soon become tame.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOATS AND GOAT-ANTELOPES.

1. Asiatic Tahr. 3. Rocky Mountain White Goat.

2. Alpine Ibex. 4. African Aoudad.

5. Arctic Musk-Ox.]

THE GOATS

Though the dividing-line between the sheep and goats is very indistinct, some differences are of general application. The goats are distinguished by the unpleasant odor of the males, and by beards on the chins of the same s.e.x, by the absence of glands in the hind feet, which sheep possess, and by certain variations in the formation of the skull. The difference between the temperament of the sheep and goats is very curious and persistent, showing itself in a marked way, which affects their use in domestication to such a degree that the keeping of one or the other often marks the owners as possessors of different degrees of civilization. Goats are restless, curious, adventurous, and so active that they cannot be kept in enclosed fields. For this reason they are not bred in any numbers in lands where agriculture is practised on modern principles; they are too enterprising and too destructive.

Consequently the goat is usually only seen in large flocks on mountain pastures and rocky, uncultivated ground, where the flocks are taken out to feed by the children.

On the high alps, in Greece, on the Apennines, and in Palestine the goat is a valuable domestic animal. The milk, b.u.t.ter, and cheese, and also the flesh of the kids, are in great esteem. But wherever the land is enclosed, and high cultivation attempted, the goat is banished, and the more docile and controllable sheep takes its place. In Syria the goat is perhaps more docile and better understood as a dairy animal than elsewhere in the East. The flocks are driven into Damascus in the morning; and instead of a milk-cart calling, the flock itself goes round the city, and particular goats are milked before the doors of regular customers.