The Desert World

by Arthur Mangin

Cuvier divides the ruminants into two great sections: one comprising the ruminants without horns (genera, camel, lama, and chevrotain); and the other, those with horns. The latter he again divides into ruminants with decaying or wooden horns (these are the cervidæ of the new nomenclature), ruminants with membraneous horns (as the giraffes), and ruminants with hollow horns (oxen, goats, antelopes, sheep).

The section of Ruminants without horns is represented in the Steppes by the camel. Of the three groups of horned ruminants, one only is wanting in this region of the Old Continent—namely, that of the ruminants with membranous horns; but we meet there with varieties of all the species included among the cervidæ, except the reindeer, which is confined to the glacial countries of both continents. The common European stag is found on this side of the Oural, in the Steppes bordering on the forests, where he prefers to seek an asylum. The ahu, or roebuck of Tartary, inhabits the valleys and plains which stretch to the north of the Himalaya and along the chain of the Thian-Chan. Deer wander in troops, or in isolated couples, in all the temperate and fertile portions of the zone of the Steppes, and the eland is spread over all Asia between the 45th and 41st degree of latitude. The latter is the largest of all the cervidæ. It ordinarily attains, and sometimes exceeds, the stature of the horse. His antlers, spread out perpendicularly to the axis of his head, take at first a nearly horizontal direction, then spring upwards in an abrupt curve. At their extremity they terminate in a broad palm, set with sharp snags around its outer edge. Their weight, for adults, averages from fifty-five to sixty-five pounds. The eland has a short robust neck, which is necessary to enable him to support the burden of his branching honours; but which, joined to the projection of his shoulders, and the disproportionate length of his fore-legs, gives him a very ungraceful aspect. Nor can he browse the herbage without making a great digression or falling on his knees. The male, moreover, under the throat has a sort of goître, or swelling, garnished with a rude pointed beard. The female wears a beard, but has no goître. The neck is surmounted with a short, stiff, blackish mane. The rest of the hair is of a pronounced gray.

The eland inhabits the marshy plains and banks of rivers; he dreads the heat, and to escape it will often remain during the long summer days plunged up to his neck in the cool waters. He lives with his comrades in tolerably numerous herds. The first birth of the female is only one; afterwards she produces two at a time. Frequently the eland attains a prodigious stature. An individual killed in the Altaï measured four feet and a half in height to the shoulder, and four feet and a third in length. His flesh is said to be light and nourishing; his hide excellent for making shoulder-belts; and his antlers are converted to the same uses as the horns of the stag.

Among the hollow-horned ruminants I may mention the Saiga, a kind of antelope which inhabits the Asiatic Steppes, and is met with even in Poland. In figure he takes the poetical elegance of the gazelle; his horns are of a clear yellow colour, and of a transparency which rivals that of tortoise-shell. His forehead is covered with transversal folds; he has no muzzle, properly speaking, but a kind of snout like that of a hog. It is said that he drinks through his nostrils. The saigas travel in herds of about two thousand each, of whom a certain number keep always some distance in advance, in the rear, and on the flanks of the main host, so as to watch over their security.

Another kind of gazelle, the Dseren, is peculiar to the Mongolian Deserts, and named by the inhabitants the yellow stag. His stature is little inferior to that of the deer. The female is without horns.

The Moufflon,[28] the original of our domestic sheep, sometimes strays into the plains of Central Asia, but prefers the solitude of the mountains. His general size is that of a small fallow deer, but though clothed with hair instead of wool, he bears a closer resemblance to the ram than to any other animal. In summer his hair is close, but in winter it becomes rough, wavy, and slightly curled. On the upper part of the body it is brown, but the under part and insides of the limbs are whitish. The hair is considerably longer under the throat, and about the neck and shoulders, than elsewhere.

We may refer, in this connection, to the Egagra, or wild goat, which Cuvier considers to have been the original stock of the numerous races of goats spread over various regions of the globe.

The Steppes nourish two species of Rodents: the Varying Hare (Lepus variabilis), so called because he changes from tawny gray in summer to white in winter; and a gray squirrel, which is probably only a variety of our common European squirrel. He is not a climber and a “haunter of the woods,” like his congener. He abounds in the Mongolian Steppes, where he lives in holes excavated under the earth, like the rats and rabbits. He is, however, much more ingenious than the other troglodyte-rodents; he shelters the entrance to his abode under a domed roof, skilfully constructed of dry herbs woven together, and covered with clay. These works closely resemble the mounds upheaved by moles.