1909. ] NEW RATEL FROM SIERRA LEONE. 397 
Pousargues, moreover, as above stated, described a specimen 
from the French Congo as having the fore part of the neck and 
the head white and the posterior part of the neck and the back 
iron-grey. His description indicates a decided contrast between 
the tints of the head and back. Finally, there is in the British 
Museum a skin from W. Africa, sent home by Mr. G. L. Bates, 
probably from the Cameroons or the Benito River, which is 
uniformly yellow-white from the forehead to the root of the tail, 
thus resembling the first published description of J/. lewconota, 
These facts, coupled with the lack of evidence that the young of 
typical I. ratel is whiter than the adult, induce me to believe 
that the name lewconota should be preserved as a subspecific title 
for, at all events, one of the Ratels, if there be more than one, 
from the Congoese area. 
2. M. cottoni Lydekker (P. Z. 8. 1906, i. p. 112, pl. vii.), from 
the Ituri Forest. Quite distinct from all the previously described 
Ratels in the absence of white on the dorsal area, the whole 
animal being black. As Mr. Lydekker suggested, this may be a 
melanotic sport; but there is no evidence of this up to the present 
time, only one example being known from the locality. 
Of the Ratels that I have seen, the one that comes nearest to 
MM. cottont in colour is an example which was purchased by the 
Society more than nineteen years ago from Cross, of Liverpool, 
and is still living in the Gardens. Its locality is unknown. It 
was entered in our books as ‘“‘ Mellivora capensis,” but the specific 
name was subsequently altered to ‘ indica”—I suppose because 
there is no whitish band defining the greyish hue of the dorsal 
surface from the black of the “underside, this being formerly 
regarded as the one distinguishing feature between the African 
and Indian forms. It is an ‘unusually dark animal, darker, in fact, 
upen the head and dorsal surface than any that I have seen 
except J/. cottoni. These areas are very dark grey, being black 
merely sprinkled with grey. One of the keepers, however, “Hoare, 
who has known the animal for nearly twenty years, tells me that 
he thinks it was a good deal greyer when first purchased as a 
young animal. Another keeper, Dixon, on the contrary, who has 
looked after it for fifteen years, says that it is the same colour 
now as when he first took charge of it. However that may be, 
there is no doubt that at the present time the animal is inter- 
mediate in colour between typical Jf. ratel and WM. cottoni. I 
cannot determine it more accurately. It may be that the dark 
hue of the dorsal surface is a sign of age. In favour of this view 
may be alleged the increase in the dark hue of the dorsal 
area with advancing years in the type of J. leuconota; and 
the fact that Blanford describes MM, indica as light grey or 
whitish grey above, whereas in two Indian specimens in the 
British Museum, both young animals, one from Nepal and the 
other from Rajpootana, the dorsal area is almost wholly white. 
If such a change typically takes place in both African and Indian 
