248 FOSSA FOSSA, 



mange les pouUes, il est d'aussi bon goust que le levraut 

 quaud il est jeune, ou que c'est une femelle» and Farassa, 

 «c'est un animal bien carnassier de la grandeur d'un 

 Renard, il a la queue fort grande et longue, et le poil de 

 la couleur de celuy d'un loup.» I think that every natu- 

 ralist will recognize in the Farassa, the Cryptoprocta 

 ferox^ the more as Flacourt gave a figure of that long 

 tailed, fox-colored animal on the plate among other Mam- 

 mals and Birds, Fishes and Reptiles. This now being an 

 irrefragable fact I cannot find a reason to oppose de Buf- 

 fon's naming Fossa the animal sent over by Mr. Poivre. 

 The name Sabady has not been used in de Flacourt's 

 book. Finally Pollen said (p. 16): «les malgaches pre- 

 tendent qu'il existe dans leur pays une autre espèce de 

 Fossa dont le pelage est d'un noir uniforme», an animal 

 up to this day never seen by an European. 



I remark that Monsieur Grandidier (Revue et Magasin 

 de Zoölogie, 1867, 2e Série, T. XIX, p. 317) mentions that 

 the indigenous of Madagascar call Cryptoprocta ferox^ Fonsa 

 [Fossa apud Pollen) and Viverra ScJdegeli, Zahada: Sabady 

 of Dr. Pollen sounds somewhat like the latter name; so 

 that it is highly probable that Pollen made confusion by 

 misunderstanding the Madagascar-men. 



The figures of the skull on plate 11 we owe to the 

 extreme kindness of Professor Milne Edwards, who allowed 

 me to take these photo's of the type-skull of «La Fossane 

 de Buifon» in the Paris Museum. Figures 1 and 2 are 

 somewhat more than natural size, figure 3 is more than 

 twice natural size. 



In the collection of the Leyden Museum (cf. my Cata- 

 logue osteologique et systematique des Mammifères) there 

 are three stuffed specimens, a skull belonging to Crossley's 

 cT-specimen and a skeleton taken out of Audebert's 9-spe- 

 cimen. This skeleton presents 13 ribs, 20 thoracic, 3 

 lumbar and 23 caudal vertebra. 



Notes from th.e Leyden. ]NXuseuixi, Vol. XX. 



