Part 12

Published by R. H Porter]

80. THE CHIRU.

PANTHOLOPS HODGSONI (ABEL).

Antilope hodgsoni, =Abel=, Calc. Gov. Gazette, cf. Phil. Mag. lxviii. p. 234 (1826); Edin. Journ. Sc. vii. p. 164 (1827); ‘=Editor=,’ Glean, in Sc. i. p. 144 (1829); =J. B. Fisch.= Syn. Mamm. p. 462 (1829); =Hodgs.= Gleanings in Sci. ii. p. 348, pls. iii., v. (1830); =id.= P. Z. S. 1831, p. 52, 1832, p. 14, 1833, p. 110; =Laurill.= Dict. Univ. d’H. N. i. p. 617 (1839); =Gerv.= Dict. Sci. Nat. i. p. 264 (1840); =Wagn.= Schr. Säug. Supp. iv. p. 420 (1844), v. p. 402 (1855); =Schinz=, Syn. Mamm. ii. p. 415 (1845); =Sund.= Pecora, K. Vet.-Ak. Handl. 1845, p. 270 (1847); =id.= Hornschuch’s Transl., Arch. Skand. Beitr. ii. p. 266; Reprint, p. 86 (1848); =Gieb.= Säug. p. 314 (1853); =Hooker=, Himalayan Journal, ii. pp. 132 & 158 (1854); =Przewalski=, Mongolia (Russian ed.), ii. pl. iii. ♂, pl. iv. fig. 2 ♀; Morgan’s Transl. ii. pp. 204 & 223 (1876).

Pantholops hodgsoni, =Hodgs.= P. Z. S. 1834, p. 80; =id.= J. A. S. B. xi. p. 282 (1842); =id.= Calc. Journ. iv. p. 291 (1844); =Gray=, Cat. Ung. B. M. p. 53, pl. vi. figs. 3, 4 (skull) (1852); =Adams=, P. Z. S. 1858, p. 521; =Gerr.= Cat. Bones Mamm. B. M. p. 232 (1862); =Fitz.= SB. Wien, lix. 1, p. 162 (1869); =Gray=, Cat. Rum. B. M. p. 33 (1872); =id.= Hand-l. Rum. B. M. p. 102 (1873); =Blanf.= Yark. Miss., Mamm. p. 89, pl. xvi. (1879); =Sterndale=, Mamm. Ind. p. 469 (1884); =Kinloch=, Large Game Shooting, p. 106, plate of head (1885); =Jent.= Cat. Ost. Leyd. Mus. (Mus. Pays-Bas, ix.) p. 134 (1889); =id.= Cat. Mamm. Leyd. Mus. (op. cit. xi.) p. 166 (1892); =W. Scl.= Cat. Mamm. Calc. Mus. ii. p. 163 (1891); =Blanf.= Mamm. Brit. Ind. p. 524 (1891); =Flow. & Lyd.= Mamm. p. 341 (1891); =Ward=, Horn Meas. (1) p. 102 (1892), (2) p. 146 (1896); =Lyd.= Horns and Hoofs, p. 157 (1892); =Percy=, Badm. Big Game Shooting, ii. p. 335 (1894).

Kemas hodgsoni, =Gray=, List Mamm. B. M. p. 157 (1843); =id.= Ann. Mag. N. H. (1) xviii. p. 231 (1846); =id.= Cat. Mamm. Nepal (Hodgson Coll.) (1) p. 26 (1846), (2) p. 13 (1863); =id.= List Ost. B. M. p. 55 (1874); =id.= Knowsl. Men. p. 3 (1850); =id.= P. Z. S. 1850, p. 112; =Horsf.= Cat. Mamm. Mus. E.I. Co. p. 166 (1851); =Temm.= Esq. Zool. Guin. p. 189 (1853); =Blanf.= J. A. S. B. xli. pt. 2, p. 39 (1872).

Antilope kemas, =H. Sm.= Griff. An. K. iv. p. 196, v. p. 328 (1827); =Less.= Compl. Buff. x. p. 285 (1836).

“The Chíru,” Quart. Orient. Mag. ii. p. 160 (1824), undè

Antilope chiru, =Less.= Man. Mamm. p. 371 (1827) (ex Quart. Orient. Mag. 1824, p. 260); =Oken=, Allg. Naturg. vii. p. 1369 (1838); =Less.= N. Tabl. R. A., Mamm. p. 179 (1842).

VERNACULAR NAMES:--Chíru of Southern Tibetans and of sportsmen generally; Tsus ♂, Chus ♀, Chiru and Chuhu (Blanford); Orongo of Northern Tibetans (Przewalski).

Height at withers about 31 or 32 inches. Hair very close, thick, and crisp. Colour pale fawn, with a peculiar fulvous or pinkish suffusion, especially on the flanks. Belly whitish, not sharply separated from the colour of the sides. Face of male black, crown and neck whitish. Sides of muzzle in male markedly swollen. Ears short, but pointed, whitish. Limbs pale greyish white, a black line running down their anterior faces in the male; female without blacker markings. Tail short, coloured like the rump.

Skull dimensions of a male:--Basal length 10·2 inches, greatest breadth 5, muzzle to orbit 6·4.

Horns long, very graceful, nearly straight, only slightly curved backwards below and forwards above, remarkably uniform in length and curvature, generally from 23 to 26 inches in length, the largest recorded being just under 28 inches.

Female similar to male, but without horns.

Hab. Plateau of Tibet.

The Chiru, or Tibetan Antelope as it is often called, although known by the vague reports of the natives as long ago, perhaps, as 1816, was first introduced to science by Abel in 1826, from information and specimens furnished to him by the great naturalist and collector Hodgson, whose name it worthily bears. As we learn from Hodgson’s article published in ‘Gleanings in Science’ for 1830, it was in 1824 or 1825 that a live Chiru was sent to him in Nepal, where he was British Resident at the Court of Catmandu. Hodgson, as was his custom, drew up an elaborate description of the animal, and, after its death, sent the notes along with the skin to Dr. C. Abel, who was at that time one of the Secretaries of the Asiatic Society at Calcutta. Dr. Abel, after making a few additions to the description, and proposing to name the animal Antilope hodgsoni, read his paper at one of the Meetings of the Asiatic Society, and, as it appears from notices in the ‘Philosophical Magazine’ of 1826 and ‘Brewster’s Journal of Science’ of 1827, had it published in the Calcutta Government Gazette or Journal.

But Hodgson, probably owing to the death of Dr. Abel shortly afterwards, was unaware of this fact, and believing that Dr. Abel had lost or neglected his communication, redescribed the species in 1830 under the name Antilope hodgsoni, which he was told that Dr. Abel had applied to it. At that date (1830) Hodgson states that the living specimen already referred to was the only example he had ever seen of this animal, and that up to that time he had never been able to get another example of it alive or dead. It is clear, however, that Hodgson shortly after this date was enabled to obtain further specimens of this Antelope. In one of his letters published in the ‘Proceedings of the Zoological Society’ for 1832 it is stated that three individuals had been examined, and in a subsequent communication (dated from Nepal in February 1834) skins of the Chiru of both sexes are referred to as being amongst other skins of mammals and birds which had been recently despatched to the Society. In the latter communication also Mr. Hodgson suggests the propriety of regarding the Chiru as representing “a new subgenus to be termed Pantholops, the vulgar old name for the Unicorn.” Naturalists have generally acquiesced in Hodgson’s suggestion on this point, and we follow the usual practice in denominating the present species Pantholops hodgsoni.

Other names, however, have been proposed. In 1827 Lesson, in his ‘Manuel de Mammalogie,’ called this Antelope Antilope chiru, quoting as his reference an article in the ‘Quarterly Oriental Magazine’ for 1824 (p. 260), which is, however, merely another version of Abel’s paper.

About the same date also Hamilton Smith, in one of the volumes of Griffith’s edition of Cuvier’s ‘Animal Kingdom,’ proposed, with a note of interrogation, to give the name Antilope kemas to the Chiru, quoting its description from one of the above-mentioned reports of Abel’s original paper.

We are quite satisfied, however, that it is best to employ the specific name hodgsoni for this species as that which was first applied to it.

Since the days when Hodgson was Resident in Nepal many British travellers and sportsmen have penetrated into the snowy ranges of the Himalaya, and have met with the Tibetan Antelope. Sir Joseph Hooker, in the second volume of his ‘Himalayan Journal,’ tells us that he saw Chirus on the Cholamoo lakes near the Donkia Pass in Sikim in October 1849. They were feeding in company with “Gaurs” (Gazella picticaudata) upon the short grass about the lake, which lies at an elevation of some 17,000 feet above the sea-level. Sir Joseph Hooker gives an excellent figure of the remarkable horns of this Antelope, which by his kindness we are enabled to reproduce, and alludes to the ideas of Hodgson (which were shared in by Hue and Gabet) of the profile view of these horns having given rise to the belief of the existence of a Unicorn in Tibet. We should mention that Blanford when he visited Sikim in 1871 was told by the Tibetans that the Chiru is not now found within a long distance of the frontier, but only beyond it in Tibet proper. He admits, however, that it is not probable that there could have been any mistake about so fine and conspicuous an animal.

Horns of Chiru.

(From Hooker’s ‘Himalayan Journal,’ vol. ii. p. 158.)]

But by far the most complete account of the Chiru yet published is that given by General Kinloch in his excellent volume on the ‘Large Game of Tibet and Northern India,’ from the second edition of which, published in 1885, we venture to extract the following particulars:--

“So far as we know, Thibetan Antelopes are never found near the habitations of man, but frequent the plains and elevated valleys far above the limits of cultivation, where few human beings, save occasional wandering shepherds, ever disturb them. The most accessible country to sportsmen where the Thibetan Antelope is to be found is Chung Chenmo, a desolate valley to the north of the Pangong lakes. In this valley, and in those of the streams which flow down to it from the spurs of the Kárá Koram mountains, Antelope are usually plentiful; and they are also to be met with all over the lofty plateau which has to be crossed on the road to Yarkand. A few have been shot in the neighbourhood of the Mánsarovárá lake near the north-western frontier of Nepál, but there are great difficulties in the way of getting there, the Thibetans jealously excluding all foreigners.

“The Thibetan Antelope is considerably larger than the Indian Antelope, and somewhat more heavily made; its remarkable thick coat of closely set brittle hairs also tending to increase its apparent bulk. The color is a light fawn, varying in shade on different parts of the body, and tending almost to white in old buck. The legs are dark-colored, and the faces of very old males are nearly black. The muzzle is very curious; instead of being fine and compressed, as is the case with most deer and antelope, it is considerably enlarged and puffy-looking; so much so, that properly stuffed heads are generally supposed by persons unacquainted with the animal to be failures of the taxidermist.

“The horns are, perhaps, the most graceful of those of any antelope: set close together at the base, they diverge in an easy curve for about two-thirds of their length, and then converging more abruptly, approach each other, in some specimens, within three or four inches at the tips. Out of twenty-five that I have shot I have never seen a pair above twenty-four and a half inches, but considerably longer specimens are to be obtained, and I have recently heard of a pair twenty-eight and a half inches. The horns are jet-black, of very fine grain, with a small central core, and being deeply notched on their anterior surface, they form perfect knife-handles and sword-hilts. When seen in profile, the forward inclination of the horns has a curious effect, the two appearing like a single horn; which has given rise to the belief that the Thibetan Antelope is the Tchirou or Unicorn Antelope mentioned by the Abbé Hue.

“Although living in such remote and sequestered regions, the Thibetan Antelope is wary in its habits. In the mornings and evenings it frequents the grassy margins of glacial streams, which frequently flow between steep banks gradually scarped out by the floods of centuries and now remote from the ordinary water’s edge. The ravines have, for the most part, been cut through gently sloping valleys; and on ascending their steep sides, slightly undulating plains will be found to stretch away, until they merge in the easy slopes of the rounded hills which bound the valley. To these plains the Antelope betake themselves during the day, and there they excavate hollows deep enough to conceal their bodies, from which, themselves unperceived, they can detect any threatening danger at a great distance. In addition to the concealment afforded by their ‘shelter pits,’ they have an additional safeguard against surprise in the constant mirage which prevails on these stony wastes during the bright hours of the day. This mirage not only distorts all visible objects in an extraordinary manner, but, like rippling water, refracts the rays of light to such a degree as to render objects altogether invisible at very short distances. It is, of course, worst near the surface of the ground, but on very hot days it attains a level of several feet; and I well remember, on one occasion, observing the slender horns of an Antelope gliding past me within three hundred yards, apparently borne on the surface of a glassy stream, in which the wearer of the horns was submerged and completely hidden from view! When Antelope are feeding on the grassy flats by the streams is the time when they may be easily approached; and then a knowledge of the ground, and of the habits of the animal, renders success in stalking them tolerably certain.”