664 Mil. R. I. POCOCK ON SOME AFRICAN CATS [June 18, 



F. servcdina appears to coincide very closely with that of many 

 West African animals like the Chimpanzee, Felis aurata and 

 others. In the British Museum there are skins from Senegal 

 (Winwood Reade*), Sierra Leone (the type), Monbuttu (Emin 

 Pasha), and Entebbe. In 1874 Dr. Sclater recorded it from 

 Kinsembo on the borders of Angola and the Congo. Bocage 

 saw skins from the interior of Angola and from Caconda t ; 

 and Sir Harry Johnston remarks that it is found in the 

 Kingdom of Uganda and in the western province of the Pro- 

 tectorate. These localities suggest that F. servcdina occurs on 

 the fringe of the West African forest-region. How far it extends 

 into the heart of that area is a matter for conjecture. The 

 omission of the species from Pousargues's Catalogue of the Mam- 

 malian fauna of the French Congo must be cited as evidence 

 adverse to the conclusion that it is found throughout the Congoese 

 district. At the same time the omission may be attributed merely 

 to the scarcity of the animal. 



That F. served and F. servcdina, have been recorded from the same 

 country is indisputable ; but, so far as I am aware, there is as yet 

 no convincing evidence that the two forms are found side by side 

 on the same spot. Skins of both, for example, have been sent to 

 Europe labelled ' Sierra Leone,' ' Uganda,' and ' Angola.' Such 

 labels, however, are no proof that the two are found together. 

 On the other hand, Mr. Spencer Shield (quoted by Dr. Sclater) 

 speaks of the Serval as common in Angola and Loango. Bocage 

 received the Serval from several places in Angola (Ambacca, 

 Quillengues, and Huilla). Both these authors give different 

 localities in Angola for F. servcdina, and neither expresses a 

 doubt as to the distinctness of the two forms. Finally Sir Harry 

 Johnston states that the Serval is abundant in the Uganda 

 Protectorate up to the verge of the Congo forest, though not 

 within the forest; and he speaks in different terms of the 

 distribution of the Serval ine Cat within that country. This is 

 clearly a question about which more evidence is required before a 

 correct opinion can with certainty be arrived at ; but as a working 

 hypothesis it may be assumed that F. servcdinci inhabits the 

 triangular area, or at all events the fringe of that area, whose 

 angles are situated, broadly speaking, at Sierra Leone, Angola, 

 and Uganda ; and that the Serval is distributed in the countries 

 lying to the north, east, and south of that area. Here and there 

 it appears that the two ' forms' mutually encroach on each other's 

 territories, without, however, actually meeting in the same places, 

 each probably being addicted to a particular kind of country. 



to prevent this statement and the one 1 have made from being necessarily 

 contradictory. Some examples of J?, serval senegalensis are, in a sense, intermediate 

 in pattern between boldly blotched examples of typical or subtypical Servals and of 

 F. servalina ; but there is no doubt whatever as to which of the two forms they 

 belong. 



* The localities of this collector's material are, I understand, open to doubt. 



t J. Sci. Lisboa (2) i. p. 176, 1890. 



