THE STRIPED HY^NA. 207 



depredations has arrived. Their gait is awkward, and usually 

 slow and constrained ; when scared, however, from their prey, 

 or when pursued by the hunter, they fly with tolerable swift- 

 ness, but still with an appearance of lameness in their motions, 

 resulting from the constant bending of their posterior legs."* 



THE STRIPED HY^NA. 

 (Hycena vulgaris, Desm. Canis Hy&na, Linn.) 



The striped hyaena, which is no doubt the hyaena of the 

 ancients, inhabits the greater part of Asia and of Africa, pene- 

 trating in the former as far as India, and extending over all the 

 northern part of the latter continent. 



According to Desmarest, its ordinary height at the shoulders 

 is nineteen inches j and the length, from the muzzle to the tail, 

 about three feet three inches -, but one which Mr. Cross had at 

 Exeter 'Change, in 1828, was twenty-five inches high. The 

 ground colour of this species is an uniform brownish grey, 

 which is somewhat darker above than beneath j and the sides 

 of the body and the outsides of the legs are marked by several 

 irregular transverse blackish or brownish stripes. The body 

 is covered with long hair, which grows in the greatest luxuriance 

 on the nape of the neck and down the spine, thus forming a 

 * Abridged from The Tower Menagerie (1829), p. 7175. 



