Allen — Generic Names of the Mephitinm. 65 



wrote quutuor in lapsus for quinque.'^ If Coues had taken 

 Catesby's description and jigure instead of Linntexis's erroneous 

 and repeatedly corrected diagnosis, it seems very improbable 

 that he would have revived Vierra putorius for a species of 

 Spilogale. 



Again, Mr. Howell says that the reason Ciivier excluded Vi- 

 verra zorilla from his Mouffettes is because Cuvier ''considered 

 it to be a weasel from the Cape of Good Hope and not a skunk 

 at all." It is true, as I have before shown, that Cuvier be- 

 lieved that Viverra zorilla was a South African animal, but it is 

 also true that he had specimens of it, and probably really ex- 

 cluded it on the same grounds that lead present day naturalists 

 to exclude it from Mephitii and assign it to a separate genus 

 Spilogale, namely, the character of the skull and teeth, f So, 

 as said in my former paper, f he purposely excluded from his 

 Mouffettes the only then known species of Spilogale, thus ren- 

 dering it impossible to transfer the name Mephitis to the Spilo- 

 gale group, as Mr. Howell has attempted to do. 



Mr. Howell's contention that Cuvier's Mustela putida is based 

 dii-ectly on Viverra putorius Linn. I am unwilling to concede, 

 but hold that its real basis is the Conepate of Buffon. The two, 

 however, have the same basis, Catesby and Kalm, but the Cone- 



*It is important to note in this connection that Sehreber, Erxleben, 

 Zimmermann, and Gmelin wrote quinque and not quatnoi', and that 

 Sehreber, evidently with Catesby's work before him, corrected Linnreus 

 in quoting his diagnosis, as shown by the following literal transcript 

 from Sehreber: "Viverra putorius; Viverra fusca (vielmehr nigricans), 

 lineis qv;atuor (oder eigentlich quinque) dorsalibus parallelis albidis. 

 LINN. Syst. [ed. 12] p. 64, n. 4."— Sehreber, Siiuget., Ill, p. 442. 



It may be further noted that Cuvier's diagnosis is evidently from 

 Gmelin and not from Linnteus, for he says: "Noir, a cinq lignes paral- 

 lels, blanches sur le dos;"' and that his "Viverra putorius L." should 

 unquestionably stand Vi-v err a putorius Gm. It also renders it probable 

 that Cuvier's citation of "Viverra mepJiitis L." under his "le chinche" 

 should also read Viverra mepJiitis Gm., as Mr. Howell has already sug- 

 gested (N. Am. Fauna, No. 20, p. 14). 



f"Si nous venons a examiner'.en lui-meme 1 'animal "auquel Buf- 

 fon a apliqu6 le nom de zorille, et qu'il a represente Hist. Nat. in-4°, 

 tome XIII, pi. 42 [lege xii] nous trouvons qu'il ressemble par les dents, 

 par les ongles et par la forme, comme par la grandeur, a notre putois 

 d' Europe.' '—G. Cuvier, Ann. du Mus. d'Hist. Nat., IX, 1807, p. 445. 



fBull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., XIV, 1901, 330. 



