NOTE 1.—­Ramusio has “Adam’s apple” for apples of Paradise.  This was some kind of Citrus, though Lindley thinks it impossible to say precisely what.  According to Jacques de Vitry it was a beautiful fruit of the Citron kind, in which the bite of human teeth was plainly discernible. (Note to Vulgar Errors, II. 211; Bongars, I. 1099.) Mr. Abbott speaks of this tract as “the districts (of Kerman) lying towards the South, which are termed the Ghermseer or Hot Region, where the temperature of winter resembles that of a charming spring, and where the palm, orange, and lemon-tree flourish.” (MS. Report; see also J.  R. G. S. XXV. 56.)

["Marco Polo’s apples of Paradise are more probably the fruits of the Konar tree.  There are no plantains in that part of the country.  Turtle doves, now as then, are plentiful, and as they are seldom shot, and are said by the people to be unwholesome food, we can understand Marco Polo’s saying that the people do not eat them.” (Houtum-Schindler, l.c. pp. 492-493.)—­H.  C.]

The Francolin here spoken of is, as Major Smith tells me, the Darraj of the Persians, the Black Partridge of English sportsmen, sometimes called the Red-legged Francolin.  The Darraj is found in some parts of Egypt, where its peculiar call is interpreted by the peasantry into certain Arabic words, meaning “Sweet are the corn-ears!  Praised be the Lord!” In India, Baber tells us, the call of the Black Partridge was (less piously) rendered “Shir daram shakrak,” “I’ve got milk and sugar!” The bird seems to be the [Greek:  attagas] of Athenaeus, a fowl “speckled like the partridge, but larger,” found in Egypt and Lydia.  The Greek version of its cry is the best of all:  “[Greek:  tris tois kakourgois kaka]” ("Threefold ills to the ill-doers!").  This is really like the call of the black partridge in India as I recollect it. [Tetrao francolinus.—­H.  C.]

(Chrestomathie Arabe, II. 295; Baber, 320; Yonge’s Atken. IX. 39.)

NOTE 2.—­Abbott mentions the humped (though small) oxen in this part of Persia, and that in some of the neighbouring districts they are taught to kneel to receive the load, an accomplishment which seems to have struck Mas’udi (III. 27), who says he saw it exhibited by oxen at Rai (near modern Tehran).  The Ain Akbari also ascribes it to a very fine breed in Bengal.  The whimsical name Zebu, given to the humped or Indian ox in books of Zoology, was taken by Buffon from the exhibitors of such a beast at a French Fair, who probably invented it.  That the humped breeds of oxen existed in this part of Asia in ancient times is shown by sculptures at Kouyunjik. (See cut below.)

[Illustration:  Humped Oxen from the Assyrian Sculptures at Koyunjik.]

A letter from Agassiz, printed in the Proc.  As.  Soc.  Bengal (1865), refers to wild “zebus,” and calls the species a small one.  There is no wild “zebu,” and some of the breeds are of enormous size.