442 Mr. R. 1. Pocock on the Pattern of the 



between the roars of the two species; and as an additional 

 argument in favour of the view that lions and tinkers are 

 related, it may be urged that the roar of a tiger is sufficiently 

 like that of a lion to be easily mistaken by those who have 

 never noted the differences between the two sounds. The 

 differences, of course, are obvious, but the similarity is also 

 unmistakable. The roar of the tiger, in fact, is much more 

 like the roar of the lion than it is like the roar of any other 

 species of Felis that I have heard. 



It is, in my opinion, quite evident that too much import- 

 ance has been attached by earlier authors to absence of 

 pattern in adult examples of some species of Felis. The lion 

 and the puma, for example, are suggestively juxtaposed both 

 in Jardine^'s monograph of this group, published in 1834, and 

 in that of Dr. Elliot, published in 1883 ; and Trouessart, even 

 as lately as 1904, kept the puma and the lion in the same 

 subgenus. But if appeal be made to the primary pattern 

 of these two species, as shown by the cubs, and not to the 

 secondary coloration of the adult, which is probably of 

 comparatively recent origin, very little support will be found 

 for the view tliat the two are nearly related forms. 



I have only had the opportunity of examining the skins of 

 two newly born puma cubs, one in the collection of the 

 Zoological Society of London, the other in the Museum of 

 the Zoological Gardens at Clifton. Although the pattern of 

 the two is in the main identical, they differ in certain 

 respects so markedly from each other that it is probable that 

 one or both of the parents of the one were specifically or 

 subspecifically distinct from one or both of the parents of the 

 other *. 



In the Zoological Society^s specimen (PL XX.) the ground- 

 colour is a brownish fawn, fading to white on the underside and 

 on the inner side of the limbs. There is white above the eyes, 

 on the upper lip, lower lip, and chin, the cheek below the post- 

 ocular stripe being a dirty white. The sides and top of the 

 muzzle are dark brown, and both the front and hind legs 

 from the elbow and hock to the tips of the toes are also 

 dark brown and without spots. On the side of the head a 

 black stripe extends backwards from the corner of the eye 

 beneath the ear, where it expands into a large dark patch. 

 Above the inner corner of each eye a black stripe runs back- 

 wards on to the summit of the head, and between these 

 are two narrower stripes. On the head these four stripes 

 apparently become zigzagged and more or less broken up. 



* The puma {F. concoJor) of the older autliors has been divided into a 

 number of species and subspecies of late years. It would be extremely 

 iuterestinff to know what the cubs of all these forms are like. 



