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long tapering tails through many successive generations. Now, 
the tail of their specimen was exactly that of the true wild cat, 
whilst the head -and body-were of the exact average length, 
{ foot io inches. Other distinctive features he had not had the oppor- 
tunity of observing, but the general description of the wild cat applied 
with perfect exactness. ‘The ground tint of the fur is yellowish, or 
sandy grey, diversified with dark streaks drawn over the body and 
limbs in a very tigrine manner. These stripes run nearly at right 
angles with the line of the body and limbs, so that the creature has 
been termed, with some justice, the British Tiger. A very dark chain 
of streaks and spots runs along the spine, and the tail is thick, short, 
and bushy, with a black tip and rings of a very dark hue. The stripes 
along the ribs and on the legs are not so dark nor so clearly defined as 
those of the spine. The tail is barely half the length of the head and 
body.” 
Mr. St. John pointed out that the wild cat stood higher on its 
legs in proportion to its size than the domestic cat; and that its 
strength and ferocity when hemmed in or closely pressed were 
perfectly astonishing. That this animal, shot in Sussex, and presented 
as a true wild cat, was fierce and active enough for one, might be 
gathered from the fact, that as it lay wounded to death it seized 
the retriever by the throat, and so lacerated the windpipe 
that the dog died the next day. It was a desperate enemy to 
poultry and game, especially in the north of Scotland, where it 
still escaped the gamekeepers gun. The Zoologist for April, 
1873, spoke of “that reputed Scottish mammal, the wild cat,” 
and, “of this mythical creature,” and added “there is no British 
mammal, or reputed British mammal, of whose character, locality, and 
even existence, we are so totally ignorant as the wild cat.”* On the 
29th of the same month Mr. A. H. Cocks replied in a short notice 
headed “ The Wild Cat not a Myth,” and gave an account of one which 
he had kept alive for the previous thirteen months. She was one of 
_ five he had seen alive, and_was trapped in Inverness-shire. He tells 
us “she became to a certain extent tame; that is, although she never 
left off her habit of perpetually swearing when receiving a visit, she 
will come, when tolerably happy, from her ‘ bedroom’ to the other half 
of the hutch cage she inhabits to receive food.” He mentioned 
several others which had been kept in captivity, including six within 
two years at the Zoological Gardens, where Mr. Bartlett has now either 
