ASPROPOT'A310. See Aciamous, ante.
ASS, Equus asinus, a well-known quadruped, usually referred by naturalists to the same genus with the horse (q.v.), but which it has recently been attempted to make the type of a distinct genus (asinus), including all the solid-hoofed quadrupeds (solidangula or equida, see HousE) except the horse itself. The distinction is founded on the short hair of the upper part of the -tail and the tuft at the end of it, the darker stripes with which the color is marked, and the absence of the hard horny warts which are found on the hinder-legs of the horse, although the forelegs exhibit warts in a similar position. The long ears of the A. are one of the characteristics of the species, but they are longer in domestication than in a wild state. It is usually also distinguished by a black cross over the shoulders, formed by a longitudinal and a transverse streak, the general color being gray; but when the general color is darker or lighter than usual, the cross is often less apparent, or to be observed with difficulty. The facial line is arched.
Some uncertainty still exists as to the origin of the domestic A.; a number of wild races having been described, some of which are perhaps, like the wild horses of America, the progeny of animals that have escaped from domestication. The probability, however, appears to be that the A. is a native of central Asia, where it is found in a perfectly wild state, in Tatary, Mesopotamia, Persia, etc., on the banks of the Indus, and even to the southern extremity of Hindustan; but its range does not extend so far northward as that of the wild horse—a circumstance which may perhaps partly account for the inferiority of the domestic A. in northern climates. The wild A. is found both in mountainous districts and in plains; •vast troops roam over the great Asiatic deserts, migrating, accord ing to the season, in summer, as far northward as the Ural; in winter, southward to the borders of India. It is fond of bitter and saline herbage. and of brackish water. It was first accurately described by Pallas, under the name landau, which it bears on the high steppes around the Caspian sea. It was, however, well known to the ancients, and is
called onager and (minus sylvestris by Pliny, who also mentions, under the name henzionus, another species (equva Itentionw), a native of the same regions, now called the kiang, or the dziggethai. The latter name appears to be of Turkish origin, and to signify mountain A., but seems to be sometimes applied to the one of these species and sometimes to the other. This seems also to be the case with some of their other eastern names, as khur or goor, and is a source of no little confusion.—The cross on the shoulders is less observable in the koulan than it usually is in the domesticated A. It ought also to be mentioned that, iu one remarkable particular, the domesticated A. agrees with the eguushentionus, and differs from the koulan, the infra-orbital foramen of the skull being situated much lower. But the kiang neighs like a horse, and the other &rays. The harshness of the voice of the A. is ascribed to two small peculiar cavities situated at the bottom of the larynx.
The allusions to the wild A. in the Old Testament, and particularly in Job xxxix., naturally excite the surprise of readers acquainted only with the dull domestic drudge, the emblem of patience and stolidity; but to this day they are beautifully appropriate to the wild A. of " the wilderness," which has the "barren land" or "salt places" fpr its dwelling, and "the range of the mountains" for its pasture.—The wild A. has a short inane of dark woolly hair, and a stripe of dark bushy hair runs along the ridge of the back from the mane to the tail. It has longer legs, and carries its head higher than the domestic A. Its troops have always a leader. It is a high-spirited animal, very fleet and very wary, trying to the utmost the powers of the hunter. It is a principal object of the chase in Persia, where its flesh is prized as venison is in Europe, and it is accounted the noblest of game. 'Xenophon, in his Anabusis, describes the wild A. as swifter of foot than the horse, and its flesh as like that of the red deer, but more tender.