Colouration of Vertebrata. 93 



The markings over the vertebrae are not in continuous lines, as 

 in many mammals, but form a series of vertebra-like spots. This 

 plan of decoration is continued even on the tail, which is coloured 

 more on the upper than on the lower surface. 



The spotted cats have their spot-groups arranged on the flanks 

 in the direction of the ribs, at the shoulder and haunch in curves, at 

 the neck in another pattern, on the back of the head in another; and 

 the pattern changes as each limb-joint is reached, the spots decreas- 

 ing in size as the distance is greater from the spine. See Figs. 9-15. 



There is in tigers, and the cat-tribe generally, a dark stripe over 

 the dental nerve ; and the zygoma, or cheek-bone, is often marked 

 by colour. Even the supraorbital nerve is shown in the forehead, 

 and there are dark rings round the ears. In dissecting an ocelot at 

 the Zoological Gardens in 1883, a forked line was found immediately 

 over the fork of the jugular vein. 



The colouration in these animals seems often to be determined 

 by the great nerves and nerve-centres, and the change from spots, 

 or stripes, to wrinkled lines on the head are strikingly suggestive 

 of the convolutions of the brain, falling, as they do, into two lateral 

 masses, corresponding with the cerebral hemispheres, separated by a 

 straight line, corresponding with the median fissure. This is well 

 shown in the ocelot, Fig. 15, and in many other cats. 



That the nerves can affect the skin has already been pointed out 

 in Chapter VI., in the case of herpes, and that it can affect colour is 

 shown in the Hindoo described in the same place. 



So marked, indeed, is this emphasis of sensitive parts that every 

 hair of the movable feelers of a cat is shown by colour to be 

 different in function from the hairs of the neck, or from the stationary 

 mass of hair from which the single longer hair starts. 



In the Badger, Fig. 16, there is a bulge-shaped mass of coloured 

 hair near the dorsal and lumbar regions, but it is axially placed. 

 The shoulder and loins are well marked, although in a different 

 manner from other species. In some species of deer, and other 

 mammalia, there are white or coloured lines parallel to the spine, 

 and also, as in birds, spots coalesce and form lines, and lines break 

 up into spots. 



The great anteater has what at first seems an exceptional mark- 

 ing on the shoulder, but a careful examination of the fine specimen 

 which died at the Zoological Gardens in 1883, we were struck with 

 the abnormal character of the scapula, and we must remember that, 



