= 
426 Mr. R. I. Pocock on some of the Cranial 
coarser at the base than at the apex of the glans, where they 
become obsolete. As is well known, the domestic cat (Felis 
catus) has a spicular glans; but in a leopard (Panthera 
pardus) the glans was smooth. 
Feet.—For a proper appreciation of the peculiarities of the 
feet of Acinonysx it is necessary briefly to describe those of 
one of the more typical members of the family. The feet of 
the common leopard (Panthera pardus) will serve as well as 
another for this purpose. . 
The fore paw is broad (fig. 3, A). The webs extend 
almost up to the distal ends of the digital pads, which are 
smooth and soft and subelliptical in shape, with rounded 
distal ends. The plantar pad is large, wide, asymmetrical, 
and smooth and cushion-like, and marked posteriorly by 
two shallow grooves defining the lateral lobes. The pollical 
pad is small and rounded and set approximately half-way up 
the space between the plantar and carpal pads. This space 
is less than the width of the plantar pad, and the carpal pad 
is large, cordate, and apically rounded. 
The claw of the pollex is enveloped by a hood-like sheath. 
The sheaths of the claws of the remaining digits consist of 
a pair of lobes—an external and internal—connected over the 
base of the claw above by a flap of integument. These lobes 
are sufficiently large to conceal the tips of the retracted claws. 
The hind foot (fig. 3, B) in its general features is similar 
to the fore foot, but is a little smaller, has the plantar pad 
more symmetrical, the edges of the webs considerably more 
emarginate and scarcely extending beyond the proximal ends 
of the digital pads, and the claw-sheaths considerably smaller, 
especially the inner lobes of the second, fourth, and fifth 
digits, the claws of which are sheathed mainly externally, 
i. e., away from the middle line. 
The feet of Acinonyax were by Mivart dismissed as differing 
rom those of felis in having imperfectly retractile claws, 
although the retractile elastic ligaments found in Felis are 
present. The function of these ligaments is to pull the 
terminal claw-bearing phalanx alongside the outer surface of 
the penultimate phalanx, thus raising the tip of the claw 
off the ground. So far as the action of these ligaments is 
concerned, the claws of this genus are approximately, if not 
quite, as retractile as in some species of Felis. The incom- 
pleteness of their withdrawal, therefore, arises from some 
other factor—and this is the total absence of the lobes of 
skin constituting the claw-sheaths in Felis *. 
* Lydekker, therefore, is misleading when he says “the claws can 
only be partially withdrawn into their protecting sheaths’ (Royal Nat. 
