80 MESSRS. WATSON AND YOUNG ON THE [Jan, 14, 



possible, supplementing these where it has been deemed expedient 

 by illustrations sketched from recent dissections. Necessarily this 

 course of procedure, especially as applied to the muscles, entails 

 somewhat lengthy accounts. This doubtless, from some points of 

 view, is objectionable ; we have preferred to adopt it, however, 

 rather thau refer to groups of structures as being " arranged in the 

 usual manner," a system of recording observations which, however 

 satisfactory to the author, frequently renders a paper utterly useless 

 to subsequent workers. 



So far as the records of the older writers (notably Herodotus', 

 Aristotle^ Pliny', and jElian*) attest, their observations on the genus 

 Hycena are practically limited to a consideration of the external 

 features and sexual peculiarities — a misconception having existed 

 on this latter point, which has extended to the present time. 



Beyond this their writings are almost entirely confined to lengthy 

 accounts of the various superstitions respecting the Hyaena and 

 certain of its individual parts. Of all these a fair summary is to be 

 found in Topsel's collection from the writings of Gesner and others*. 

 Here also the hermaphroditic nature of the species is referred to 

 and denied. 



Subsequently to this time, as might naturally be expected in the 

 case of so common and familiar a Carnivore, the detailed anatomy of 

 the genus has received more or less attention at the hands of various 

 observers. Except in so far as the osseous system is concerned, how- 

 ever, it is somewhat astonishing to find that the record of their 

 work which constitutes the modern literature concerning Hyana, 

 refers only {i. e. when the species is definitely stated) to //. striata or 

 to H. brunnea, the Spotted Hyaena having apparently thus far enjoyed 

 almost a total immunity from the scalpel. 



We would specially indicate here, as embodying the greater part 

 of what is known regarding the soft parts of the former species, 

 that descriptive accounts of the visceral organs have been given by 

 Reimann^ Rudolphi, Daubenton'', and Hunter", whilst MeckeP and 

 Cuvier^", who also seem in the main to have limited their obser- 

 vations to this species, refer not only to the viscera, but also to the 

 muscular arrangements, Meckel further making isolated references 

 to the viscera of H. crocuta. The muscles of H striata are fully 

 illustrated, in plates 129-142 of Cuvier and Laurillard's ' Myology' ". 

 Respecting H. brunnea, Dr. Murie ^^ has contributed a paper on the 

 viscera and female generative organs, and indicated some of the 

 characteristic myological features of the species. 



' Eawlinson's Herodotus, toI. iii. ' Historia Aiiimalium, vi. 



^ Pliny, viii. ■* Historia Animalium, i. 



* The History of Four-footed Beasts and Serpents, collected out of the 

 writings of Conradus Gesner and other writers, by Ed. Topsel, 16.58, p. .339. 



« De Hyaena, Berol. 1811. 



'' Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, tome is. 



* Essays and Observations, edit, by Owen, 18fil, vol. ii. 



* Anat.omie Comparee. 



'" Lemons d'Anat. Comp. " Eeeueil de Planches de Mvologie. 



'^ Trans. Zool. Soc. Lond., vol. vii. p. 503. 



