Select Specimens of Natural History Collected in Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile. Volume 5.Bruce, James
History
Select Specimens of Natural History Collected in Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile. Volume 5.
Bruce, James
Natural history -- Egypt; Natural history -- Ethiopia; Nile River; Plants -- Egypt; Plants -- Ethiopia; Scientific expeditions -- Egypt
the country where the saphan is; but that he builds houses, or nests of
straw, as Solomon has said of him, in contradistinction to the rabbit,
and rat, and those other animals, that burrow in the ground, who cannot
be said to build houses, as is expressly said of him.
The Christians in Abyssinia do not eat the flesh of this animal, as
holding it unclean, neither do the Mahometans, who in many respects
of this kind in abstinence from wild meat, have the same scruple as
christians. The Arabs in Arabia Petrea do eat it, and I am informed
those on Mount Libanus also. Those of this kind that I saw were very
fat, and their flesh as white as that of a chicken. Though I killed
them frequently with the gun, yet I never happened to be alone so as to
be able to eat them. They are quite devoid of all smell and rankness,
which cannot be said of the rabbit.
I have no doubt that the El Akbar and the El Webro of the Arabs, are
both the same animal. The El Akbar only means the largest of the
Mus-montanus, under which they have classed the Jerboa. The Jerd, and
El Webro, as also the Ashkoko or Akbar, answer to the character of
having no tail.
BOOTED LYNX.
This is a very beautiful species of Lynx, and, as far as I know, the
smallest of the kind. His body from the tip of the nose to the anus
being only 22 inches. His back, neck, and forepart of his feet are of
a dirty grey. His belly is of a dirty white, spotted with undefined
marks, or stains of red. Below his eyes, and on each side of his nose,
is a reddish brown,the back of his ears being of the same colour, but
rather darker; the inside of his ears is very thickly clothed with fine
white hair, and at the end is the pencil of hairs distinctive of this
genus. On the back of his forefeet, he has a black streak or mark,
which reaches from his heel two inches up his leg. On his hinder
foot he has the same, which reaches four inches from the heel, and ends
just below the first joint, and from this circumstance I have given him
his name.
[Illustration: _Lynx._
_London Publish’d Dec.^r 1^.{st} 1789. by G. Robinson & Co._]
His tail is 13 inches long, the lower part of it, for 6 inches, is
occupied with black rings. Between these rings his tail is nearly
white, the rest much the same colour as his back. From his nose to his
occiput is 4 inches and three quarters. From one eye to the other,
measuring across his nose, is one inch and three quarters. From the
base of one ear to that of the other, is 2 inches and 2/8ths. The
aperture of the eye three quarters of an inch, and of a yellow iris.
The length of his ear from its base to the point of the pencil of hairs
at the top of it, 4 inches and three quarters. From the sole of his
forefoot to his shoulder, as he stands, 13 inches and three quarters.
From the sole of his hind foot, to the top of his rump, 15 inches and a
quarter.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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