1854.] 9 



has arisen much confusion and indecision. I have selected from these writers of 

 a former age, the following animals which appear to have heen then well known, 

 but are now forgotten or overlooked ; I beg leave to call the attention of natur- 

 alists to this subject, with the hope that they may be all found and accurately 

 described, or else struck out from the number of those enumerated among the 

 productions of America. 



Felis rufa, or Bay Cat of Pennant, Arc. Zool., vol i. p. 51. 



With yellow irids, ears erect, tufted with black long hair; color of the head, 

 body, and outside of the legs and thighs a bright bay, obscurely marked with 

 dusky spots; the forehead marked with black stripes, from the head to the nose; 

 cheeks white, varied with three or four incurvated lines of black; the under 

 and upper lip, belly, and inside of the legs and thighs white, the inside of the 

 upper part of the fore legs crossed with two black bars ; the tail short, upper 

 part marked with dusky bars and near the end with one of black, the underside 

 white; fur short and smooth ; twice the size of a common cat, (that is 27 inches 

 long,) said to come from the interior of New York: probably erroneous. Described 

 by Mr. Pennant from the living animal. 



The common wild cat of our country, found in all the northern, southern, and 

 western states, has in latter years been confounded with this species ; I think, 

 however, they cannot but be distinct. Mr. Pennant, the best naturalist that 

 England has ever produced, could never have confounded two animals so dis- 

 similar. It is true, in describing one, he had before him the living animal, in 

 the other a dried skin, but of the last, he could examine hundreds. He certainly 

 could not have mistaken the indistinct brownish grey of the one for bright bay, 

 nor could the last color have faded into the other. 



The common wild cat, however, never should have been called Felis rufa, 

 even if it was identical with Pennant's animal, as Ray had described it in his 

 Synopsis Methodica Animalium, p. 169, as Catus montanus. If these two ani- 

 mals are the same, why has the name given so long even before the birth of 

 Pennant, been discarded, in defiance of the rule of priority in nomenclature ; 

 when it was last described, it was easy to restore the name of montanus. A 

 just regard for the name of Ray, if nothing else, surely demanded this. 



A description follows of the Felis montana, as I knew it in Georgia, made 

 from numerous specimens either living or recently killed, including probably 

 every variation to which the animal is liable. 



Felis montana. Mountain Cat, Pennant, Arc. Zool., vol. i, p. 51. Catus mon- 

 tanus, Ray, Synops. Method. Animalium. 



Above, hair mixed dusky, and pale brown, top of the head brown striped lon- 

 gitudinally with dusky, cheeks with dark brown, back with dusky ; the last 

 sometimes wanting. Irids yellow, ears black, upright, and slightly pencilled, 

 especially during the winter; with a broad, transverse, cinereous bar. Cheeks 

 on each side with a large semicircular tuft of long hair. Legs spotted with dark 

 brown, sides most frequently obscurely spotted with the same, sometimes, how- 

 ever, not spotted; chin and throat white, with a black stripe on each side, form- 

 ing an angle ; sometimes these stripes are wanting, or very faintly marked in 

 pale brown. Belly, inside of the thighs, and hind part of the fore legs whitish, 

 spotted with black. Tail, above, generally very faintly annulate with brown; 

 these rings often disappear; tip black, beneath white, which color appears on the 

 upper part at the tip, whenever the hair is in any way disturbed. Feet beneath 

 dusky or dark brown. 



Mean length of 12 specimens 31 inches, tail 6. 



I have given the foregoing very full description, that it may be compared with 

 the preceding. Most of the marks which are common to the two, belong to al- 

 most every species of the genus Felis. I add two obscure species, of which but 

 little is known. I am not willing to pronounce them distinct from each other or 

 from the montana, without farther examination. The first was seen in Califor- 

 nia by my son, and the description and measurements were made by him ; the 

 other is extracted from Lewis and Clarke's travels. 



