The class of ruminating animals is, of all others, the most numerous and the most varied. It contains, as we have seen, a great number of species, and, perhaps, a still greater number of distinct races, or constant varieties. Notwithstanding all our enquiries, and the considerable details into which we have been obliged to enter, we freely confess, that we have not exhausted the subject, and that there still remain even very remarkable animals which we are only acquainted with by imperfect fragments, and are unable to ascertain with precision to what class they belong. For example, in the very great collection of horns in the royal cabinet, as well as those dispersed in private museums, each of which, after much labour, and a multiplicity of comparisons, we have referred to the animal it belonged; there still remained one without label, or any mark affixed to it, absolutely unknown. This horn is large, almost straight, and composed of a very thick black substance; it is not solid, like that of the stag, but resembles that of the ox. From the base to beyond the middle of the horn is a thick ridge, raised about an inch; and although the horn is straight, this prominent ridge makes a spiral turn and a half in the interior part, and is wholly effaced in the superior part of the horn, which terminates in a point. This horn, which differs from every other, seems to have the nearest affinity to that of the buffalo; but we were ignorant of the name of the animal to which it belonged, and it was not till hunting through the different cabinets that we found in that of M. Dupleix part of a head adorned with two similar horns, and to which was affixed a label with these words: “the horns of an animal nearly like a horse, of a greyish colour; with a mane on the fore part of its head like a horse; it is called at Pondicherry coësdoës, which should be pronounced coudous.” This little discovery gave me great pleasure; but I have not been able to meet with this name coësdoës, or coudous, in the writings of any traveller; the label only has informed us that it is of a large size, and to be met with in the hottest countries of Asia. The buffalo is of the same climate, and has likewise a mane; it is true his horns are crooked and flat, while those of the coudous are round and straight, which, together with the colour, are sufficient indications of the difference of these two animals; for the buffalo has a black skin and hair, and, according to the label, the hair of the other is grey. These relations suggest others: the travellers in Asia speak of the large buffaloes of Bengal, of red buffaloes, and of the grey buffaloes of the Mogul empire, which are called nil-gauts; the coudous may possibly be one or other of these animals, and the travellers into Africa, where the buffalo is as common as in Asia, more precisely mention a species of buffalo, called pacassa at Congo, which from their indications seems to be the coudous. “In the route from Louanda to the kingdom of Congo[Y], we perceived two pacassas, which are animals resembling buffaloes, and which roar like lions. The male and female go always together; they are white, spotted with red and black; their ears are about half an ell long, and their horns are perfectly straight: they neither fly at the sight of the human species nor do any injury, but only stare at them as they pass along." We have before mentioned, that the animal, called at Congo, empacassa, or pacassa, appeared to be the buffalo. It is, in fact, a kind of buffalo, but differs from it by the shape of the horns and the colour of the hair; in one word, the pacassa is the coudous, which perhaps forms a separate species from that of the buffalo, and perhaps, also, may only be a variety of it[Z].
[Y] Relation de Congo, par les PP. Michael-Ange de Galline et Denys de Charly de Plaisance, Capuchins.
[Z] The coudous is from five to eight feet in height. The body is of a bluish ash colour, with a black mane. The head is reddish; the tail is black at its extremity, and terminated by a little tuft. Both sexes have horns. They are of a deep black colour, and two feet in length. The Hotentots make tobacco pipes of them. Their flesh is excellent.
To finish the history of goats, gazelles, chevrotains, and other animals of this genus, which are all found in the old continent, it only remains to give that of the Musk, an animal as famous as it is unknown. This is the animal which produces the real musk; all modern naturalists, and the greatest part of travellers through Asia, have mentioned it, some by the name of a stag, a roe-buck, or a musk-goat, and others have considered it as a large chevrotain. It seems indeed to be of an ambiguous nature, participating of all the above animals, yet at the same time we can assert, that its species is different from all other quadrupeds. It is about the size of a small roe-buck, but its head is without horns, and by this character it resembles the memina or chevrotain of India. It has two great canine teeth or tusks in the upper jaw, and by this it approaches the chevrotain of India; but what distinguishes the musk from all other animals is a kind of bag about two or three inches in diameter, which grows near the navel, and in which the liquor, or rather the greasy humour called musk is secreted, and which differs from that of the civet both in smell and consistence. Neither the Greeks nor Romans mention the musk animal. The first that noticed it were the Arabs. Gesner, Aldrovandus, Kircher, and Boym have given more extended accounts of this animal; but Grew is the only person who has made an exact description of it, from a skin which was preserved in the cabinet of the Royal Society of London. His description is as follows:—“The musk stag is about three feet six inches in length, from the head to the tail; the head is about half a foot long; the neck seven or eight inches; the fore part of the head three inches broad, and the nose sharp like that of a greyhound; the ears are erect, like those of a rabbit, and about three inches long; the tail is not above two inches; the fore-legs, including feet and thighs, are thirteen or fourteen inches long; he is cloven-footed, armed on his fore-feet behind and before with two horny substances: the hind feet were wanting. The hair of the head and legs about half an inch long, and very fine; thicker under the belly, and an inch and a half in length; on the back and crupper they are three inches, and three or four times thicker than the bristles of a hog, of course more so than that of any other animal. It is brown and white alternately, from the root to the point; on the head and thighs it is brown; under the belly and tail white; a little curled, especially on the back and belly; it is very soft, and has the appearance of being something between a common hair and a quill; on each side of the lower jaw, under the corners of the mouth, there is a small tuft of thick hair, which is short and hard, about three-fourths of an inch long, and somewhat resembling the bristles of a hog. The bladder, or bag, which contains the musk is about three inches long, two broad, swells out from the belly about an inch and a half, and stands near as much before the groin. The animal has twenty-six teeth, sixteen in the lower jaw, of which the eight in front are incisive, the four grinders behind, are rugged and continuous, and as many similar grinders in the upper jaw. There is also a tusk about two inches and a half long on each side in the upper jaw, which terminate in the form of a hook, not round but flat, and have a sharp edge behind. They have no horns, &c.[AA]”
[AA] Grew’s Museum.