152 MR. R. I. POCOCK ON [Feb. 19^ 



or may not show signs of transverse linear arrangement. The neck 

 and the shoulders may be striped or merely speckled. The fore 

 and hind limbs are transversely barred ; the f oi-mer are typically 

 black behind up to the wrist and the latter np to the hock. The 

 tail also is transversely barred above, sometimes throughout its 

 length, sometimes only in its distal portion, the tip being black. 



In specimens that I regard as typical of this Cat the pattern is 

 very similar to that of the European Wild Cat {F. sylvestris). 

 In others the transverse stripes break up into more or fewei-, 

 larger or smaller spots. In others the spots are evanescent, the 

 fur being merely " ticked," a gradation being traceable from the 

 first or sylvestris-ty^e to the last, which are, I believe, the so- 

 called " Abyssinian " and " Ticked " breeds of the fanciers. I 

 have obtained all these types from the Cats' Home in Camden 

 Town, London, in the space of a few weeks, as well as a fine red 

 variety of the spotted kind. With the exception of the sylvestris- 

 type, all these phases can be matched approximately in the series 

 of skins of F. ocreata preserved in the British Museum. 



Specimens which are intermediate between the " spotted " and 

 the " ticked " types— those, that is to say, in which the spots are 

 very small and closely set, giving a blackish nppearance to the 

 skin except on the legs and ventiul siirface where the stripes are 

 apparent — deviate from the normal in exactly the same way as 

 the two South- African Leopards described by Dr. Giinther* differ 

 from normally spotted Leopards. 



In the British Museum Collection there are skins of this 

 Domestic Cat from such widely sejoarated localities as Crete, 

 India, Madagascar, Celebes, and Mexico. The specimen from 

 Celebes was shot on Bonthain Peak. It is noticeable that its 

 stripes and spots are browner than in typical European examples ; 

 and in the skull the posterior portion of the nasals is more com- 

 pressed and the interparietal crest is higher and traceable as a 

 ridge all along the parietals. The narrowness of the nasals 

 recalls that of the skulls of two Siamese Cats that I have seen 

 (c/. infra, p. 163), and the height of the interparietal crest is 

 paralleled in the skull of a rufescent Indian Cat t which formerly 

 belonged to Mr. H. C. Brooke and was, I understand, a well- 

 known prize-winner at Cat Shows some few years ago. For 

 further information about torquata, see below, pp. 164-165. 



The following description, taken from a number of skins, will 

 perhaps convey a tolerably clear conception of the plan {cf. text- 

 fig. 60, p. 154) to which the patterns of F. catus, however 

 diversified in detail, are reducible : — 



Ground-colour typically brownish or grey, frequently washed or 

 clouded with blackish. Head and face normally striped. The 

 internal or admedian cervical stripes abbreviated on the fore part 



* P. Z.S. 1885, p. 243, pi. xvi. ; id. op. cit. 1886, p. 203, fig. See also W. L. 

 Sclater, Manim. S. Afr. i. p. 36, fig. 10 (1900). 

 t This Cat, Mr. Brooke tells me, was brought as a kitten from a hotel in Bombay.' 



