914 MR, R. I. POCOCK ON THE FEET 
vibrisse vary in length and number according to the species. 
The interramal tuft is placed nearly in a vertical line with the 
corner of the mouth when closed. As in most Fissiped Carnivores, 
there are two genal tufts, one behind the corner of the mouth, 
nearly in a vertical line beneath the posterior canthus of the eye, 
the other usually much higher up the cheek and farther back. 
The genera of Canide hitherto established and admitted rest 
mainly upon cranial and dental characters. 
Speothos venaticus Lund. 
(Text-fig. 1, A, B.) 
The feet of this rare dog, of which I have only been able to 
see dried skins, were figured by Flower (P. Z.8. 1880, p. 70), who 
dismissed them with a mere reference, and this figure was repro- 
duced by Mivart in his ‘Monograph of the Canide’ (p. xv.) to 
illustrate the structure of the feet characteristic of that family. 
As a matter of fact, the feet differ from those of all other genera 
of the Canide in two very important particulars, namely, the ex- 
tensive basal fusion of the third and fourth digital pads of both 
the front and hind feet, and the approximation of the digital 
pad of the first digit of the fore foot to the inner proximal 
angle of the plantar pad. Moreover, the area between the 
large plantar and the carpal pads of the fore foot 1s somewhat 
scantily hairy, especially externally, where a nearly naked strip 
of integument passes from pad to pad, and the edges of the inter- 
digital integument connecting the second and third and the 
fourth and fifth digits is naked on both the anterior and the 
posterior paws, and the area between the digital and plantar 
pads appears to be sparsely covered with short hairs *. 
From its low position, the first digit, it seems, must reach the 
ground when the animal is standing in the normal position, 
especially if the soil be soft. Coupled with the scantiness of the 
hairy clothing of the area above or behind the plantar pad, this 
suggests that Speothos is more plantigrade than any other existing 
dog; and it may be recorded in this connection that the mother 
of a specimen sent to the Gardens in 1879 (P. Z. 8. 1879, p. 664) 
was killed in a creek and that two of the skins in the British 
Museum are labelled ‘‘ Shot while running along creek.” 
If this dog habitually haunts the borders of streams, its planti- 
grade and scantily hairy feet must be an advantage for progres- 
sion on sandy or muddy banks. It appears to me to be impossible 
* Except for the forward position of the first digit and the fusion of the third and 
fourth digital pads in the fore foot, Flower’s figure does not show these features 
well, and it is noticeable that the third and fourth digital pads on the hind foot are 
represented as separated throughout. The shape of the pads too and the median 
position of the carpal pad throw doubt upon the reliability of the figure. Hence it 
may be that the very marked asymmetry between the second and fifth digits on both 
feet is also exaggerated. But since the figure was taken from a fresh example that 
point may be correct. If so, it is full of interest; but on dried skins I cannot find 
convineing evidence that the second digit is so far in advance of the fifth as Flower’s 
figure indicates. 
