SPOTTED AND STRIPED MAMMALS 



Then in Fig. 27 we have a striking series of transitions in the 

 smaller Cats from spots to stripes. Some specimens show only 

 spots on the flanks ; others, spots coalesced into wavy or beady 

 stripes; and others show more finished stripes, like those of Fig. 

 28. In the British Museum enclosure there is a Domestic Cat 

 which I often stop to look 

 at. The posterior half of its 

 body is spotted ; the anterior 

 half is striped transversely ; 

 the neck and head are striped 

 longitudinally ; the legs are 

 striped transversely, and 

 also spotted. Then along 

 its spine it has a broad black 

 band, and its tail is ringed 

 in its terminal half. Here 

 we have a sort of general- 

 ised marking, combining a 

 little of each of the special 



features of distinct races of animals, the black band along the 

 spine in some animals being possibly the only vestige of ancestral 

 spotting ; while the ringed tail in the Racoon is the only vestige 

 left to tell the tale of its ancestral markings. 



In the International Fur Stores I saw the skin of a Tiger which 

 had a large ocellus towards the ventral region. This same skin 

 had a modification of stripes on the lumbar region, as if the 

 pigment were undecided whether it would run into separate stripes 

 or form an ocellus. Then in another Tiger skin I saw on one side 

 a curious rosette, and on the other a pair of parallel stripes. Both 

 these abnormalities in the Tiger markings are given in Fig. 29 

 (No. i). They are not only curious, but very suggestive. 



FIG. 28. Striped Cat, from a photograph by 

 Messrs. Dixori and Son. Near the root of the tail 

 it has a few rosettes. 



