Note 56 — Chapter V

Dampier also alludes to the wild oxen of the Philippine Islands, which were in reality the very interesting Tamarao buffalo. The only wild buffaloes in Celebes would be the still more interesting Anoa peculiar to that island. Both the Tamarao and the Anoa offer resemblances in the horns and skull to extinct buffaloes once living in northern India. The Anoa is the smallest of the Ox tribe, and the most generalized type of living oxen; that is to say, the type which most resembles antelopes. It is quite a small creature, not much bigger than a very large sheep, and the horns are perfectly straight and directed backwards in a line with the nasal bones of the skull. The Anoa generally shows two white spots on each side of the cheeks, and white markings on the throat and legs (which reappear also in the Tamarao of the Philippine Islands), similar to the white spots and stripes in the Tragelaphine antelopes, like the Bush-buck, Kudu, and Nilghai.