240 THE GEOGRAPHY OF MAMMALS 



family, and only alluding to the less-known and more 

 insignificant forms when remarkable for their special 

 distribution or otherwise. 



Section II. — Distribution of the Cat-like 

 Carnivora 



The iEluroid, or Cat-like Carnivora, among which 

 will be found the largest and most perfectly organized 

 terrestrial animals in the present condition of the world, 

 that have been modified to prey upon their weaker 

 brethren, embrace four families, the Cats, Civets, Aard- 

 Wolf, and Hyenas. The first family, the Felidm, or Cats, 

 contains about fifty species of true Fells, together with the 

 Cheetah, or Hunting-Leopard, which it is necessary to 

 refer to a separate genus. The Cats are distributed all 

 over the main portions of both the Old and New Worlds, 

 failing, however, as already remarked, in the Australian 

 Kegion, and not extending quite so far north nor quite 

 so far south as the Bears and Dogs. No single Cat, how- 

 ever, has anything like this wide area of distribution, all 

 the species being more or less limited in their extension, 

 and the Cats of the Old and New Worlds being always 

 specifically different, unless it be in the case of the 

 Northern Lynxes. We will shortly describe the specific 

 areas of some of the best-known of these animals. 



The Lion, the undoubted king of beasts, though it for- 

 merly penetrated far into Europe and even into England, 

 is in these days essentially an African animal, but still ex- 

 tends throughout Arabia, Asiatic Turkey, and Persia into 

 Western India, where it occurs in the Western Provinces. 



