Mode of Life.

Partial to water and mud, swampy localities.

Semi-aquatic in its habits,--sometimes called the Water Buffalo.

Fond of wallowing in mire, and swims well.

Lives much in the water, and feeds on aquatic plants.
Ranges in mountain forests, and feeds on leaves and buds of trees.
Migratory in its habits--fond of bathing in marshy swamps.
Lives chiefly on the woody banks of rivers--feeds on bark of trees,
lichens, and herbaceous plants.
Feeds on the short herbage peculiar to the tops of mountains and
bleak plains.
Lives chiefly on rocky mountains.

Delights in the deepest jungles--feeds on leaves and shoots of
brushwood.
Lives entirely on woody-mountains--feeds on shoots and shrubs.
Half domesticated.
Domesticated, and artificially fed.
So completely domesticated, as to be subject to an endless variety of
diseases, and generally requires medical attendance.

THE INDEFINITE DEFINITIONS OF COL. HAMILTON SMITH.

On commencing this Monograph of the _Genus Bos_, I entertained the
confident expectation, that in the voluminous work of Cuvier's 'Animal
Kingdom,' translated and enlarged by Griffith and others, I should find
all that related to generic and specific distinction so clearly
exhibited, and so systematically arranged, that I should have no
hesitation in adopting the classification there set forth, and no
difficulty in determining the place of any new species or variety. With
this expectation I diligently studied that portion of Col. H. Smith's
volume on the Ruminantia, which treat of the _Genus Bos_, and I here
subjoin (verbatim) the generic and subgeneric characters there given of
that Genus, by which it will be seen how far they fall short of the
clearness and precision which are indispensable to a scientific work.

GENERIC CHARACTERS.

"_Genus BOS._--Skull very strong, dense about the frontals, which are
convex, nearly flat, or concave; horns invariably occupying the crest,
projecting at first laterally; osseous nucleus throughout porous, even
cellular; muzzle _invariably broad_, naked, moist, _black_; ears, _in
general_, _middle sized_; body _long_; legs _solid_; stature _large_."

Generic characters should be such as will apply to every species in the
genus; they should likewise be such as will distinguish the genus
described from every other genus. From such observations as I have been
enabled to make, the five last-mentioned characters do not appear to
accord with either of