"> I ZOOLOGY. 



plete, but they have no opposing thumb. According to tin- 

 mode of life of these animals, their intestinal canal i> short -. 

 tlu-ir jaws and their muscles strong, in order to seize and 

 devour their prey ; their head from this circumstance 

 large. The jaws are short, thus favouring their strength. 

 and the form of the temporo-maxillary articulation proves 

 that the teeth are made for tearing and cutting, but not for 

 grinding or masticating. The canine teeth are large, long, 

 and very powerful ; the incisives, six in number in each jaw, 

 small; the molar, sometimes entirely adapted for cutting, in 

 others surmounted with rounded tubercles, presenting no 

 conical points, arranged as in the insectivora. One of these 

 molar teeth is usually much longer and more cutting than 

 the others, and has therefore been called the carnivorous 

 molar tooth; behind these (on each side) are one or two 

 molars, almost flat, and between the carnivorous molar and 

 the canine a variable number of false molars. The food of 

 the animal, whether exclusively carnivorous or mixed with 

 other matters, may be judged of by the varying proportions of 

 these cutting or tuberculated parts of the molar teeth. 



Animals of this order have generally the toes armed with 

 claws adapted to hold and to tear their prey; usually also 

 they have no collar bones. This kind of organization is met 

 with in the genera cat, hyjena, viverra, martin, otter, dog, 

 badger, bear, &c. 



Fig. 193. 



The genus cat (Fig. 194). which may be viewed as the 

 type of the earn ivora, comprises not only the common cat. but 



