FELIS. 215 



' The Lion; Hindustani, Sher, Singha; Persian, Shir; Bengali, 

 Shingal ; Guzerat, Untia bag ; Kattywar, Sawach. 



Distribution. — Africa from Algeria to the Cape ; Mesopotamia 

 on the west flanks of the Zagros range and Persia south of Shiraz, 

 but not on the tableland; India (see notes below). 



The Lion was formerly more widely spread in India than it is at 

 the present day. The districts in which it occurs or has occurred are 

 Guzerat in the extreme west of India, Central India and Bundelcund. 

 Blanford in the Journal As. Soc, vol. xxxvi, p. 189, gives accounts of 

 a lion shot near Rewah in 1866 ; also of a lion stoned to death by a 

 Mr. Arratoon of the Police at Sheorajpur, 25 miles west of Allaha- 

 bad ; in the Asian newspaper of June 3Cth, 1885, Colonel Martin, 

 of the Central India Horse, mentions that he and General Travers 

 killed in i860 two lions on a hill to the west of Goona in Gwalior ; 

 and in 1862 he, with Colonel Beadon, Deputy Commissioner, turned 

 out and killed no less than eight lions at a place called Patulghur, 70 

 miles north-west of Goona. The last lion in Central India, of which 

 I can find any record, was shot by Colonel Hall near Goona in 1873. 

 Of the Lions of Guzerat, an exceedingly good account is given by 

 Major General Rice in a book called " Indian Game," published in 

 1884. I have heard too of a lion being killed in 1888 in Guzerat, 

 so that it is evident that the lion is not extinct in India yet, 

 although it seems probable that he soon will be. 



An account of the lion of Mount Abu (a skull of which is in 

 the collection) is given by Dr. G. King (/. f.). 



The skull of the lion is easily distinguished from that of the 

 tiger by the two following points : — 



(i) In the lion the posterior processes of the nasal bones do 

 not' extend so far back as the frontal processes of the 

 maxillae; in the tiger the posterior processes of the nasals 

 extend back far beyond the frontal processes of the 

 maxillae. 

 (2) In the lion the distance between the anterior parietal suture 

 and the postorbital processes is much shorter than in the 

 tiger, so that the former may be called a short-waisted 

 skull as compared with the latter. 

 There does not seem to be any differences in the teeth. 



...... Babu H. M. Roy. 



Kattywar Zoological Gardens. 



Zoological Gardens. 



Zoological Gardens. 



Algeria A. D. Bartlett, 1849, 



A.S.B. 



E. BIyth, A.S.B. 



People's Park, Madras. 



Mount Abu, Rajputana G. King, 1868. 



c. ..: WoombeH's Menagerie. 



Zoological Gardens. 



M. Skull juv. (newborn) O. L. Fraser, 



