1904.] Allen, Mammals from Tropical America. 47 



from Rancho de R. Jimenez, April 21, and one from Juan 

 Vinas, March 22. 



17. Felis carrikeri, sp. nov. 



Type, No. 19211, ? ad., Pozo Azul, Pirris Province, Costa Rica, 

 May 14, 1902; A. M. Carriker, Jr., for whom the species is named. 



A small, short-tailed cat, with full, soft pelage. Above, from the 

 nose to the end of the tail, brownish black, quite black over the whole 

 dorsal area, lighter and browner on the lower border of the sides, pass- 

 ing gradually into the very dark chocolate brown of the ventral sur- 

 face; outside of limbs very dark chocolate brown, irregularly and 

 rather indistinctly clouded with blackish brown; inside of limbs like 

 the ventral surface, indistinctly blotched with darker spots; ears ex- 

 ternally blackish brown, like the top of the head; lips and cheeks uni- 

 form blackish, like the rest of the head; tail above uniform brownish 

 black, like the middle of the back, lighter and slightly clouded with 

 darker on the sides and below. 



Measurements. Total length, 970; tail vertebrae, 276; hind foot, 

 101. Skull, total length, 86; basal length of Hensel, 73; zygomatic 

 breadth, 55; least interorbital breadth, 16; intertemporal breadth, 

 28; width of braincase above meatus auditorius, 38; length of nasal 

 bones, 18; breadth of nasal bones across anterior border, n; do. op- 

 posite nasal process of frontals, 6.2; audital bulla, 18 x 10; breadth 

 at posterior end of carnassials, 30.5 ; front of canine to posterior border 

 of carnassial, 25; length of upper carnassial, 10; length of lower car- 

 nassial, 7.5 ; length of lower jaw (front base of incisors to end of angu- 

 lar process), 55; height of jaw at condyle, 11.5; do. at coronoid, 21.5. 



Contour and proportions of the skull as in Felis apache and Felis 

 fossata Mearns (Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., XIV, pp. 149-151, August 9, 

 1901), but smaller and lacking the nasal fossa of the latter, in this 

 respect agreeing with F. apache. The skull here described is that of 

 an adult (middle-aged) female. 



The dark coloration of the type specimen and the obscure 

 spotting on the limbs suggests a melanism of some form of 

 the F. pardalis group, or that it may be, normally, a short- 

 tailed spotted cat. Its small size, as affirmed by the size 

 and age conditions of the skull, renders it, however, impractica- 

 ble to refer it to any of the known forms of the pardalis group, 

 the smallest of which enormously exceeds in size the type of 

 Felis carrikeri. On the other hand, the skull agrees very 

 closely in size with the smallest of the small-headed, long- 

 tailed spotted cats of South America, but the shortness of the 



