| OCR Text |
Show 660 ON THE CERVINE ANIMALS OF HAINAN. [Dec 9. to enter thorny thickets. The Le people procure them, and barter their hides for cloth. The hides are good for sleeping upon, as they protect against the damp ground." 4. This allusion to the " Mountain-Cow" induces m e to extract the observations in the same Chinese work on that animal. After mentioning domestic cattle which have run wild, the book says : - " There is another race, like cattle, but with red eyes. They walk about among the hills in herds, and are not pressed at the sight of men. They are called • Mountain Cows.' In the hills of the Le territory they are particularly abundant." The "Mountain Horse," or Sambur, has similar hair, we are told. Can the "Mountain C o w" be the Budorcas taxicolor of Hodgson, or some species allied to it ? This must for the present remain a question, as I learned nothing of this animal from the natives, and got no samples of it. 5. The Kiung shan Heen che (or Gazetteer of the Kiungshan District of Hainan), the Chinese work referred to above, also mentions the King, an animal " like the Spotted Deer, but smaller, and of a black colour." The character King (pronounced Kim-ng in Amoy) is the local name in Fokien for the Cervulus reevesi; and the same character is read Kia in the Hainan dialect; but in this work another character is given for the Kia of Hwangkia, the Hainan name for the Cervulus vaginalis. I should have thought that the King of the Chinese work might apply to some species of Capricornis, perhaps to C. sumatrensis, which occurs in Malacca and Tenasserim, but for the following remarks made in the same list of Hainan animals. "The Choo or Me drops its horns in the fifth moon (July). The velvety horns are of use, and as good as those of the Spotted Deer." A work of the former Han dynasty says that the hills of Tanurh and Choogai (districts into which Hainan was divided in the last century B.C.) abound in Choos and Kings. Yen Shekoo, in a commentary on the above, explains that the Choo is like a spotted deer, but larger. The 'Ming Yuen,' or "clear illustrations," "affirms that a full-grown Luh, or spotted deer, is called a Choo. The herd follow it, observing its tail as their guide. Its tail is used for brushing off dust. Flap carpets with it, and they will not breed moths. Placed between crimson silks, the colour of the silks will not fade for years." It will thus be seen that Choo (which is written with the radical for deer, and the character for lord) is simply the monarch or leader of a herd of spotted deer, which in Hainan would be Panolia. In the same way, with reference to the Formosan Deer, I have discovered that Me applies to a large buck of the Sambur group. The character King is here adopted, apparently, for the Panolia iu its dark winter dress. 6. Under the head of Hare another and the last Cervine animal is spoken of as "a large species (of Hare), called Pe, oi a grey colour, with feet like a deer. The Kiungchow people often keep it alive." This must be a species of Tragulus, and probably, I think, T. meminna, oi which the British Museum has a specimen from Cambodia. I did not have the good fortune to fall across this little animal on m y visit to Hainan. |
