ORDER CARNIVORA ; GENERAL CHARACTERS. 203 



(occupying the same position with the bicuspid teeth of Man, 

 ANIM. PHYSIOL., Fig. 92), being more or less pointed, and 

 termed false molars; the next being especially adapted for 

 dividing animal flesh, by the form of its summit, which is raised 

 into a cutting edge, and termed carnivorous teeth ; and the last, 

 or hindmost, having summits more or less rounded or tuberculated. 



182. The proportion which these different classes of molar 

 teeth bear to each other in degree and development, accords with 

 the relative carnivorous propensity of the different families. 

 Thus, in the Cat tribe, which in a state of nature is exclusively 

 carnivorous, the tuberculated molars are entirely wanting in the 

 lower jaw, and are very small in the upper ; whilst the carni- 

 vorous molars are of very large size, and the false molars 

 partake of their form. On the other hand, in the Bears, which 

 are adapted to derive a great part of their subsistence from 

 vegetable food, there are three large tuberculated molars on each 

 side of each jaw ; and the size and sharpness of the carnivorous 

 tooth are not nearly as remarkable as in the preceding group. 

 And in the Dog tribe, which is intermediate in this respect 

 between the two extremes, there are two tuberculous grinders 

 behind each carnivorous tooth ; and this tooth is itself partly 

 tuberculated, that is, a portion of its sharp cutting edge is 

 superseded by a rounded summit. We find the alimentary 

 canal formed in accordance with the character of the teeth ; for, 

 the nature of the food being such that it is easily reduced to a 

 fluid form by the process of digestion, and the whole of the 

 nutritious matter being easily removed from it, a long, compli- 

 cated intestinal tube would have been superfluous ; and instead 

 of its length being thirty times that of the body (as in many 

 herbivorous animals), it is no more than three times as long as 

 the body in the Cat tribe, though of greater length in the less 

 carnivorous species. The stomach, too, is very simple in its form, 

 and is of small size in comparison to the bulk of the animal ; for 

 the facility with which the food is digested, allows it to pass 

 rapidly through that organ, instead of its being long delayed 

 there, as it is in the capacious paunch of the Ruminantia. 



183. The whole conformation of these animals is evidently 



