18G7.] DR. J. E. GRAY ON THE FELID.E. 399 



caligata, ft, Fischer, Synopsis, p. 208 (from F. Cuvier's figure), is 

 only a melauisni. 



The largest Cape specimen measures, body and head 30, tail 1 5 

 inches. 



Most of the specimens of Felis caligata from Africa, like Felis 

 domestica, F. indica, and F. torquata and many other species, have 

 the hinder part of the feet black ; but this is not a permanent cha- 

 racter ; for some of the smaller paler specimens of F. caligata have 

 the hind feet paler than the back of the animal, and some of these 

 have the heels more or less brown or blackish on the outer edges. 



In the British Museum there is a specimen of Felis domestica that 

 was collected, by Mr. Darwin, wild in the woods at Maldanado, men- 

 tioned in the 'Voyage of the Beagle,' Mara. p. 20. It shows how 

 nearly the Domestic Cat is to the above species : it chiefly differs 

 from F. caligata in the tail being more slender and tapering, the 

 colours more intense and defined, and in the throat being pure 

 white. It is dark grey, grizzled with black streaks and spots; the 

 streaks on the legs are wide, those of the fore legs more or less 

 confluent. The tail is grey for two-thirds of its length, with black 

 rings, the Itinder one being broadest ; the hinder third of the tail 

 is black, with a small pure- white tip. The stripes on the loins are 

 straight and parallel, not subspiral as in the Tabby Cats, The 

 cheek-streaks are black, the lower one indistinct and interrupted. 

 The toes are white. 



The smaller Spotted Cats of the warmer parts of Asia have all 

 been regarded as one species by Mr. Blyth, following in the wake of 

 Temminck ; but it is to be observed that the latter naturalist only 

 had the specimens from Java and Sumatra to examine. Perhaps if he 

 had had in his museum specimens from Nepal, Bhootan, China, and 

 the various districts of continental India, he would not have regarded 

 them as belonging to the same species, as he did those from Java 

 and Sumatra. They, no doubt, are very similar, and we know that 

 the Spotted Cats, as the Leopard, the Jaguar, the Ocelots, and the 

 Kuichua, of Brazil are very variable ; but then in a large series of 

 these specimens the varieties pass into each other, and the countries 

 where the different varieties come from are contiguous, and diftereut 

 varieties come from the same locality. Now that is not the case 

 with the small Spotted Cats of India ; and until we have a series suffi- 

 ciently large to show how the species do pass into each other, I 

 think it is safer to regard them as valid. 



Some of the smaller-sized Spotted Asiatic Cats have a long head, 

 with an elongated skull, and complete bony orbits. The skulls are 

 longest and the orbits more developed in the Felis viverrina of 

 Bennett and the Felis pi aniceps of Vigors and Horsfield. But, be- 

 sides these, Felis rubiginosa of I. Geoffroy, in Belanger's 'Voyage,' 

 and the Cat which I described under the name of Leopardus ellioti 

 in the 'Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.' for 1837 (x. p. 260) have 

 a rather elongated skull and complete orbits, though Mr. Blyth 

 regards F. ellioti as only a variety of his F. hengalensis. 



Of the small- sized Spotted Asiatic Cats, which have an ovate 



