364 Mammatia oF INDIA. 
oblong, longer than broad, one fold on the inner, and three or four on 
the outer side. 
Acanthion—Inter-max. triangular, tapering behind; grinders sub- 
cylindrical, not longer than broad, one fold on the inner, two or three 
on the outer side. 
According to Waterhouse the European porcupine ({ystrix cristata 
of Linnzeus) is the Acanthion Cuviert of Gray ; and Gray, who afterwards 
modified his views of 1847 in 1866, wrote of it: “I am not aware of 
any external characters by which this species can be distinguished from 
the Aystrix cristata, though the skull is so different.” Gray in another 
place writes that: ‘‘ Though the skulls of A. dewcurus preserve a very 
distinct character, yet they vary so much amongst themselves as to show 
that skulls afford no better character for the distinction of species than 
any other single character, such as colour, but can only be depended on 
when taken in connection with the rest of the organisation.” In these 
circumstances I think it will be better not to attempt any further sub- 
division of the Indian porcupines in the present work beyond the two 
already given, viz. Aystrix and Atherura. ‘There is a great similarity 
between the Indian 4. Zewcurva-and the European ZH. cristata. Accord- 
ing to Waterhouse the quills in the lumbar region, which are white in the 
Indian, are dusky in the European, which last has long white points to 
the bristles of the crest, whereas in the Indian one some only of the 
points are white, and the rest quite brown. 
The Indian porcupine lives in burrows, in banks, hill sides, on the 
bunds of tanks, and in the sides of rivers and nullahs. It is nocturnal 
in its habits, and in the vicinity of cultivation does much damage to such 
garden stuff as consists of tubers or roots. In the jungle its food con- 
sists chiefly of roots, especially of some kinds of wild yam (Déoscorea). 
I have found porcupines in the densest bamboo jungles of the central 
provinces, where their food was doubtless young bamboo shoots and 
various kind of roots. 
The porcupine all the world over is known to be good eating, and is 
in many countries esteemed a delicacy. The flesh is white and tender, 
and is much prized by most people in those places where it abounds. 
Brigadier-General McMaster, in his ‘Notes on Jerdon,’ in speaking of 
the only instance where he found a porcupine on the move after day- 
light, says: ‘‘ Just at dawn a porcupine appeared, and, as I suppose his 
house was somewhere between us, trotted and fed, grunting hog-like, 
about the little valley at our feet until long after the sun was well up, 
and until I, despairing of other game, and bearing in mind his delicious 
flesh (for that of a porcupine is the most delicate I know of), shot him. 
Well may the flesh be tender and of delicate flavour, for, as many 
gardeners know to their cost, porcupines are most scrupulously dainty 
and epicurean as to their diet. A pine-apple is left by them until the 
