Buffon's Natural History. Volume 08 (of 10): Containing a Theory of the Earth, a General History of Man, of the Brute Creation, and of Vegetables, Minerals, &c. &cBuffon, Georges Louis Leclerc, comte de
History
Buffon's Natural History. Volume 08 (of 10): Containing a Theory of the Earth, a General History of Man, of the Brute Creation, and of Vegetables, Minerals, &c. &c
Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc, comte de
Natural history
To these four first species, or races of antelopes, may be added two
other animals, which greatly resemble them; the first is called _koba_
at Senegal where the French have stiled it the _great brown cow_; the
second is also a native of Senegal, and is there called _kob_, but our
countrymen denominate it the _small brown cow_. The horns of the kob
greatly resemble those of the gazelle and kevel, but the shape of the
head is different, the muzzle is longer, and there are no pits under
the eyes. The koba is much larger than the kob; the latter is about
the size of the fallow-deer, and the other is as large as the stag.
From the remarks of M. Adanson, it appears that the _koba_ is five
feet long, from the extremity of the muzzle to the insertion of the
tail; that its head is fifteen inches, its ears nine, and its horns
from nineteen to twenty, that its horns are flattened on the sides and
surrounded with ten or twelve rings, while those of the _kob_ have only
eight or nine, and are not more than a foot in length.
The seventh animal of this species is found in the Levant but more
commonly in Egypt, and in Arabia. We call it, from its Arabian name,
_algazel_; it is shaped pretty much like the other antelopes, and is
nearly the size of the fallow-deer, but its horns are long, thin, and
but little bent till toward their extremities, when they turn short
with a sharp flexion; they are black and almost smooth, and the annular
prominence scarcely observable, except towards the base, where they are
a little more visible. They are about three feet in length, while those
of the gazelle are not more than one foot, those of the kevel fourteen
and fifteen inches, and those of the corine (which, nevertheless
resembles this the most) only six or seven inches.
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