CIVETS, .MACHAIRODONTS, AND CATS i77 



Eastern Asia' and spread thence across Behring Straits into North 

 America, from which it gradually made its way to the south rn 

 part of the New World- the leopard, the snow leopard, the 

 clouded tiger, the lynxes, the smaller cats, and the cheetah. 



Felis leo. The Lion 

 Since the disappearance of the Machairodonts and the cave 

 bear this has been admittedly the grandest development of the 

 carnivorous type. It is doubtful even whether for feroaty, for 

 rresistible might, and magnificent dental armature the cave bear 

 should not be" counted inferior to the splend.d development ot 

 Hon (known as the cave lion) which inhab.ted England, and 

 France during the Pleistocene period; while as regards the 

 SlcSirodontf, though in one or two spec es Aey attamed 

 dimensions exceeding the biggest hon and the.r mouths were 

 armed with huge ivory sabres, it must be remembered that he e 

 grandest examples of carnivorous development existed m North 

 Ld above all in South America. The Machairodonts of Europe 

 were certainly armed with big flattened canme tusks, but it is 

 questionable whether they attained the same size of head and 

 body as the big cave lions. Their commonest forms were not 



much larger than leopards. ,. , , r .i,« 



The Lion differs from all existing cats, even slightly from the 



tiger, in the relatively long muzzle into which the face is 



prolonged, and also in the direction and growth of hair on the 



1 Von Zittel (H-a,,d!,uch der Palaontologk-Palaozoologie, vol. iv.-is 



mv authority for this Statement. r ^ ^^ \a ^^,,, 



' 'a fossil cat, Fclis crislata, found in the north-west of India would seem 



to indtca^ the existence there of a form intermediate between the jaguar and 



he ttoer The jaguar (which is, no doubt, only a larger development of the 



eopafd seems, togethr with the ocelot, to have once inhabited parts of 



Erefn aS, a^d tlenee to have reached North .America. Its -nge^" N"* 



America at the present day is probably confined to Mexico and Texas, but 



formerly it was me. with farther north. It is now 7f ^f ""f ^ "^^ "* 



America. Consequently its range is a singular parallel to that of the tapir 



anTailigator, both of which are found existing or fossil in Eastern Asia on the 



one hand and South and Central America on the other. 



