1882.] MR. O. THOMAS ON THE AFRICAN MUNGOOSES. .59 



3. On the African Mungooses. 

 By Oldfield Thomas, E.Z.S., British Museum. 



[Eeceived December 2, 1881.] 



(Plate III.) 



In the Zoology of the Yunnan Expedition', Dr. John Anderson of 

 the Calcutta Museum has recently fully worked out the Oriental 

 species of that difficult Viverrine group, the Mungooses ; and the 

 present paper is an attempt to treat similarly those that are found in 

 Africa. The latter, however, are very much less uniform in structure 

 than the former, as they heloug to no less than seven genera, six 

 being peculiar to xifrica, while the Oriental forms, as Dr. Anderson 

 has shown, ought all to be included in the restricted genus Herjiestes. 



The Oriental and African Mungooses together form a very natural 

 subfamily, the IIerpestina3-, quite distinct from the other large group 

 of the Viverridse, namely the Civets and Paradoxures, or Viverrince. 

 Prof. Flower, in his well-known paper on the classification of the 

 Carnivora ^ says of the Viverridse (p. 35) that ''they show a great 

 tendency to break into two groups, of which Fiverra, Paradoxurus, 

 Arctictis, &c. belong to one, and Herpestes and its various modifi- 

 cations to the other, BlajzcEna being an aberrant member of the 

 last," and (p. 20) gives a description of the characters of the base 

 of the skull in this group, compared with those of the Viverrinse. 

 Externally the members of this subfamily are distinguished by 

 their comparatively lithe and slender form, and by their generally 

 blunt, elongated, and but slightly curved claws, as compared with the 

 short, sharp, semiretractile, and strongly curved claws of most of the 

 Viveninse. 



The following are the only two previous papers of any importance 

 on the subject of the African species of this group : — (1) Temminck, 

 Esq. Zool. Cote Guiuee, pp. 93-118 (1853) ; and (2) Gray, P.Z.S. 

 1864, pp. 547-579. 



The first of these contains muc'.i useful information, especially 

 with regard to the variation to which these animals are subject'; 

 nevertheless, notwithstanding his clear insight into the badness of 

 other people's species, Temminck formed several bad species of his 

 own in it. The second, by Dr. Gray, is a complete revision of the 

 group, in which, however, such a large number of untenable genera 

 are formed, and so many bad species are made and allowed, that the 

 confusion into which the group had fallen cannot be said to have 

 been removed by it. On the other hand, it must be admitted that 



' Op. cit. p. Ills (1878). 



2 Ou the principle of strict priority this name ought to be Svricatince, SuH- 

 cata antedating Herpestes by seven year.s ; but it would be so obviously unsuitable 

 to cull the subfamily after one of its most aberrant meuibers. that T think wc are 

 iustiiied iu using the later and more classical term. 



.l"s 



3 P.Z.S. 18ti'.), p. 4. 



