This section is from the book "A Manual Of British Vertebrate Animals", by Leonard Jenyns. Also available from Amazon: A Manual Of British Vertebrate Animals.
Gray, inclining to reddish; with the dorsal line, and a transverse band across the shoulders, black: ears very large : tail terminating in a tuft of long hair.
E. Asinus, Desm, Mammal, p. 414. Ass, Penn. Brit. Zool. vol. i. p. 13. Shaw, Gen. Zool. vol. n. p. 429. pl. 216.
Smaller than the Horse, and subject to less variation than that species. Colour generally gray, more or less dark; sometimes approaching to silvery white, obscurely spotted with stains of a reddish cast, at other times dark brown or dusky: a transverse black stripe upon the shoulders, crossing another of the same colour down the middle of the back ; these marks always more or less obvious. Head shorter and thicker than that of the horse : ears long and slouching: tail tipped with long hair: no naked callosities on the hind legs.
A native of the East. Introduced into this country towards the close of the tenth century. Goes eleven months with young, and produces one at a birth. Breeds occasionally with the Horse: the hybrid production termed a Mule or a Hinny, according as the Ass is the male or female parent.
 
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