GAUR, gar or pour (Hind., from Skt. °aura, white). A wild ox (Bos gaurus) of India, prob ably the largest existing species of wild cattle, and the one hunted by Indian sportsmen under the misnomer 'Indian bison.' An old bull may stand six feet high at the withers, and speci mens have been recorded whose horns measured 39 inches, and had a basal circumference of 19 inches; but the average is less than this;.. the cow is in every way smaller. The animal is massively built, with regularly upward-curving yellowish horns decidedly flattened at their base, and has a distinct ridge above the shoulders pro duced by great upstanding spines of the vertebrae. The ears are very large, the dewlap inconspicu ous, and the tail comparatively short. In color, old bulls are dark brown, sometimes nearly black, with the crown of the head and the muzzle gray, and the lower parts of the legs pure white. The hair is fine and glossy. This grand animal is to be found in small bands throughout all the forested parts of India (except Ceylon) to the foothills of the Himalayas, and thence through the hilly districts of Assam and Burma down into the Malay Peninsula, where there are two forms, one called sladong, and the other sapio, in Proceedings of the Zoological Society of Lon don (London, 1899). It roams widely, but keeps
to the jungle, and is so alert and cunning in escape, and so formidable when brought to bay, that its chase is justly regarded as among the finest sports with a rifle in the world, and among the most dangerous, RR it must always be pursued on foot. An old hull makes an even match for the tiger himself. Nevertheless, it is not pugna cious, and rarely or never attacks human beings except when wounded or brought to bay, but shy ly retreats from man whenever possible. These cattle have not been domesticated, except partial ly by some semi-wild hill tribes east of the Ganges in company with their gayals, who keep them-as food. Consult: books of natural history and sport in India and Burma, especially Sander son, Thirteen Years Among the Wild Beasts of India (London, 1893), noting that most of these writers call the animal 'bison'; also Blanford, Fauna of British India: Mammals (2 vols., Lon don, ; Blanford, "On the Gaur and Its Allies," in Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London (London, 1890). Compare GAYAL; and see Plate of WILD CATTLE.