147 



mus Alexandrinus. He describes a small dark-coloured prickle in 

 the very tip of the Lion's tail, as hard as a piece of horn, surrounded 

 at its base by an annular fold of the skin, and adhering firmly to a 

 singular follicle of a glandular appearance. All these parts were 

 however, he remarks, so minute, and the little horny apex so buried 

 in the tuft of hair, that the use attributed to it by the ancient scholi- 

 ast cannot be regarded as any thing else than imaginary. Blumen- 

 bach's description was accompanied by a figure, which was copied in 

 the ' Edinburgh Philosophical Journal/ in the 8th volume of which a 

 translation of his paper was given. 



The subject appears to have again slumbered until 1829, when M. 

 Deshayes announced; in the 'Annates des Sciences Naturelles' (vol. 

 vii.p. 79), that he had found the prickle on both a Lion and Lioness 

 which died in the national Menagerie of France. It was described by 

 him as a little nail or horny production, about two lines in length, 

 presenting the form of a small cone, a little recurved upon itself, and 

 adhering by its base only to the skin and not to the last caudal ver- 

 tebra, from which it was separated by a space of 2 or 3 lines. 



From the period when M. Deshayes' discovery was announced Mr. 

 Woods has suffered no opportunity to escape him of examining the 

 tails of every Lion, living or dead, to which he could gain access ; but 

 in no instance has he succeeded in ascertaining the existence of such 

 an organ $ nor had he ever observed it until the specimen now before 

 the Committee was placed in his hands, within half an hour after its 

 removal from the living animal, and while yet soft at its base where 

 it had been attached to the skin. 



It is formed of corneous matter like an ordinary nail, and is solid 

 throughout the greater part of its length towards the apex, where it 

 is sharp ; at the other extremity it is hollow and a little expanded. 

 Its shape is rather singular, being nearly straight for one third of its 

 length, then slightly constricted, (forming a very obtuse angle at the 

 point of constriction,) and afterwards swelling out like the bulb of a 

 bristle to its termination. It is laterally flattened throughout its 

 entire length, which does not amount to quite 4ths of an inch. Its 

 colour is that of horn, but becoming darker, nearly to blackness at 

 the tip. Its appearance would lead to the belief that it was deeply 

 inserted into the skin, with which, however, from the readiness 

 with which it became detached, its connexion must have been very 

 slight. The slightness of its adhesion is noticed by M. Deshayes, 

 who attributes to this its usual absence in stuffed specimens. The 

 same cause will account for its absence in by far the greater number 

 of living individuals ; for, as Mr. Woods remarks, its presence or 

 absence does not depend upon age, as the Lions at Paris in which 

 it was found were of considerable size, while that belonging to the 

 Society is very small and young ; nor upon sex, for although it is 

 wanting in the female cub of the same litter at the Society's Gardens, 

 it existed in the Lioness at the Jardin du Hoi. 



Mr. Woods, considering it probable that a similar structure might 

 exist in other species of Felis, had previously examined the tails of 

 nearly the whole of the stuffed skins in the Society's Museum, but failed 



