364^ ZOOLOGY 



its nose, together with the exceedingly long red tail, make it a conspicuous 

 object. The natives verj^ frequently catch these monkeys (especially when 

 young), and they then become the most charming pets, being much more 

 cleanlv in their habits than their congeners. Their ways are peculiarly 

 winning, and suggestive of some graceful spritelike Ariel. 



]Mr. Alexander Whyte, soon after his arrival in Uganda, made an 

 interesting discovery. He obtained a specimen of the West African potto, 

 or tailless lemur (Period icticus potto). This had been thought formerly 

 to be confined to equatorial West Africa in the vicinity of Old Calabar. 

 It is evident that its range extends right across the continent to Uganda, 

 like that of the chimpanzee and other West African mammals and birds. 

 There are two or three species of galago lemurs in the country, whose 

 weird cries are often believed by the natives to be the voices of devils. 

 The young of the galago (and no doubt of other lemurs) do not arrive 

 very rapidly at maturity, taking two or more years to grow to full size. 

 Very often the young are believed by Europeans to lielong to a different 

 species from the adult on account of this difference in size. 



The bats of Uganda oftVr, so far as I know, no species peculiarly 

 confined to that Protectorate. The insectivorous bats belong mostly to 

 kinds widely spread throughout tropical Africa, though there are one or 

 two species of fruit-eating bats which are elsewhere only found in the 

 West African sub-region. Among insectivorous mammals may be noted 

 the large shrews of the genera Rkyncocyon and Macroscelides, the former 

 being the well-known elephant shrew, with a proboscis nearly an inch long. 

 Both these shrews stand and leap on their hind-legs only, like kangaroos or 

 jerboas. Also a golden mole (insectivorous) and a prettily coloured liedgehog. 



The cat-like carnivores are represented by the lion, the leopard, two 

 species of serval, Felis cafra. the caracal lynx (in the north-east), and 

 the cheetah. Felis caffra is very like the wild-cat of Egypt and Syria, 

 which was the principal element in the origin of the domestic cat of 

 Europe and Asia, though I, for one, hold that our domestic cat has a large 

 infusion of the blood of Fells catus to account for the tabby markings 

 and certain peculiarities of form not found in Felis manicidata or in 

 the domestic cat of Egypt and North Africa (which is probably descended 

 without intermixture from the wild-cat of Egypt). Felis cafra, the 

 African wild-cat, spread throughout Africa from south of the Sahara to 

 Cape Colony, bears a strong resemblance in appearance to the domestic 

 cat. It was never caught and tamed by the natives of Africa until the 

 domestic cat had been introduced from Egypt and India, or by the 

 Portuguese on the west coast of Africa. After its introduction was made, 

 it has often occurred to natives of Uganda to catch the young kittens of 

 the wild Felis caffra and bring them up as domestic cats. In addition 



