88 CARNIVORES. 
burrow, unless they are foiled by the creature digging deeper down and burying 
himself beneath the upturned soil. Other methods employed in Germany are 
either digging the animal out by following the course of the burrow, or by boring 
directly down upon it by means of a kind of gigantic corkscrew. Digging out is 
also sometimes resorted to in England, but the more common plan is to tie an 
empty sack, with a running noose round the mouth, in the entrance of the badger’s 
burrow while the occupant is abroad, and then drive him in with dogs. 
The fur and hairs of the common badger are used for the same 
purposes as those of its American cousin; but the hairs, being: stiffer, 
are better adapted for brushes. 
It has already been mentioned that fossil remains of the common 
badger are met with in the cavern and other superficial deposits of 
this country; and it may be added that they also occur in those of the Continent. 
Beyond these, however, no fossil badgers have hitherto been met with, except in 
strata of the Pliocene period in Persia. When our comparatively full acquaintance 
with the extinct Tertiary Mammals of Europe and Northern India is taken into 
account, this remarkable absence of the remains of badgers is strongly suggestive 
that Persia or the adjacent regions must have been the original ancestral home of 
these animals, from whence they migrated westwards. 
Fur. 
Fossil Badgers. 
THE MALAYAN BADGER. 
Genus Mydaus. 
As being the sole representative of the badgers inhabiting the islands of the 
Malayan region, the curious looking animal depicted in the accompanying illustra- 
tion may be appropriately designated the Malayan badger. It is known to the 
natives of Java as the melas while by the Germans it is termed, on account of 
its evil odour, Stinkdachs; its technical name being Mydaus meliceps. 
The Malayan badger forms a kind of connecting link between the true 
badgers and the under-mentioned sand-badgers, having a tail shorter than in 
the former, while its cheek-teeth are much more like those of the latter. It is 
a comparatively small animal, the length of the head and body being about 15 
inches, and that of the stumpy tail only some ? of an inch. With the exception 
of the back of the head, the top of the neck, a stripe down the back, and the tip 
of the tail, which are whitish, the general colour of the long and thick fur is dark 
brown, but lighter below than above. There is a kind of crest of long hair on the 
back of the head and neck. The muzzle is long and pointed, and almost entirely 
naked in front of the eyes, with the flesh-coloured nostrils obliquely truncated and 
mobile. The Malayan badger appears to be confined to the mountains of Java, 
Sumatra, and Borneo, ranging in the former island from an elevation of about five 
hundred to upwards of seven thousand feet above the level of the sea. In Borneo 
it is found at elevations of not more than eighty or one hundred feet, and in 
Sumatra does not ascend above one thousand feet. It is a nocturnal and burrow- 
ing animal, not uncommon in some districts. 
Horsfield, the original deseriber of this animal, says that when killed carefully, 
