External Characters of the Felidfe. 135 



Genetfa, Poiana, and Linsang have much more primitive 

 feet. On the other hand, Viverricula has a single cordate 

 carpal pad, a simple trilobed plantar pad, and a ^niall pollex 

 set almost as high as in many Felidae. The hind foot, how- 

 ever, retains a small hallnx ; and it seems tiiat the invarial)le 

 presence of this digit is the only character that can be 

 definitely affirmed as distinctive of the feet of the V'iverrinae 

 {Viverra, Viverricula, Civetitcds, and Genetta) when com- 

 pared with those of the Felidse *. 



The Anm and External Genitalia^ 



The anus and the external genitalia, botli in the male and 

 the female, of the Felidae present very little variation in 

 structure. The anus itself opens in the centre of a circular 

 area of naked skin, and in the feaiale the skin immediately 

 surrounding the vulva is naked qr sparsely liairy ; the 

 perineal region between the two is short, hairy, and un- 

 modified, and the clitoris is minute. In the male the 

 perineal region is also hairy and unmodified, and the pre- 

 puce is situated close to the scrotum. The glans penis is 

 short, subconical, usually armed with backwardly directed 

 spiny papillae, is boneless, or, at most, fortified with a small 

 bone, and the urethra opens clos^e to the tip. 



in its short unmodified perineum, the shortness of the 

 glans penis, and the closeness of the i)repuce to the scrotum 

 tiie ano-genital area of Felidse resembles that of Nandinia 

 and the Mungotid^, and, so far as I am aware, of Euplcres and 

 Linsang, My acquaintance with the area in Eupkres 

 and Linsang is, however, restricted to the female, and I 

 do not know whether the prepuce is close to the scrotum or 

 not. Fossa is another genus about which very little seems 

 to be actually known with respect to this region, except that 

 the perineum is unmodified and that the prei)uce, judging 

 from dried skins, is situated far in front of the scrotum, 

 a character which must be regarded as primitive in the 

 Carnivora, 



So far as this area is concerned, the Felidae may be dis- 

 til guished from Nandinia by the abence of the large scent- 

 gland situated- in front of the prepuce and vulva in that 

 genus, from the Mungotidse by the absence of the circum- 

 anal glandular sac and the situation of the small urethral 

 orifice at the tij) of the glans penis instead of beneath it. 



Of the remaining genera of ^luroids, the Yiverridas 



* Very exceptionally the hallux is present iu tlieFelidaB. I have feen 

 it iu a lioness. 



