DESULTORY SKETCHES IN NATURAL HISTORY. 43 



For many miles beyond Jougne, the general character of the sce- 

 nery continues, however, wild and desolate. Passing round to the 

 west of a lofty and very remarkable mountain, the Aiguille de 

 Baulmes, I entered a vast forest inhabited by many charcoal burn- 

 ers, where large fires, and the cleared spaces which had provided the 

 material for those fires, struck me as an interesting novelty, though 

 I was rather in danger of being lost, by mistaking some of their 

 numerous paths for my own road. I managed, however, to succeed 

 in getting through the forest, and then made my way across the 

 country by compass till I came to a few houses, after which I 

 had no difficulty in reaching the village or town of St. Croix, 

 which is situated oddly at the extremity or eastern end of a valley, 

 whose narrow commencement by a ravine, opening imperceptibly 

 into the wilder country to the west, I had entered, and almost 

 reached the end of, before I was aware that marks of civilization 

 were so near me. The town of St. Croix is large, straggling, and 

 modern, and hardly deserving of much attention. It is the last 

 town to the north in the Canton of Vaud ; and having conducted 

 my reader thus far, I will postpone to another chapter my journey- 

 ings in the adjoining Canton of Neuchatel; 



D. T. A. 



DESULTORY SKETCHES IN NATURAL HISTORY. 



By Edward Blyth. 



No. I.— THE HYiENA GROUP. . 



Valuable as are the zoological characters afforded by the den- 

 tition of the Mammalia, there yet requires some judgment and 

 discrimination in applying them to the grand purpose of philosophi- 

 cal classification, such as should accurately express the affinities, or 

 degrees of physiological relationship, which different genera bear to 

 each other ; inasmuch as a close similitude in the dental characters 

 subsists occasionally without indicating any particular affinity, and 

 a very considerable amount of diversity also obtains, in some in- 

 stances, between genera that are, notwithstanding, proximately, and 

 even intimately, allied together. 



