COMMON AMERICAN WILD CAT. 15 



GENERAL REMARK?. 



We are not so fortunate as to possess any specimen from Oregon, or 

 the regions west of the Roclcy Mountains, to enable us at this time to in- 

 stitute a close comparison, and therefore cannot be certain that the Cat 

 described by Lewis and Clarke, to wliich naturalists, without having seen 

 it, have attached the name of Fclis fiisciata, or that the individual de- 

 scribed by Dr. Richardson, and referred by him to Felts nifa, are identi- 

 cal with the present species ; yet as they do not present greater marks 

 of difference than those observable in many other varieties of it, and 

 as we have carefully examined several hundred specimens in the 

 museiuns and private collections of Eui'ope and America, and have, at this 

 moment upwards of twenty Ijing before us, that were obtained in various 

 parts of the country, from Texas to Canada, our present conclusion is, 

 that in the United States, east and north of the Mississippi, there are but 

 two species of Ljaix — the well known Canada Lynx, and the Bay Lynx — 

 our present species, and that the varieties in colour, (especially in the lat- 

 ter animal,) have contributed to the formation of many imaginary 

 species. Whatever may be the varieties, however, there are some mark- 

 ings in this species which are permanent, like the white ears and nose of 

 the fox squirrel, {Sc. Capistratus,) and which serve to identify it through 

 all the variations of sex, season, and latitude. All of them have naked 

 soles, and the peculiar markings at the extremity of the slender tail, which 

 terminates as abruptly as if it had been amputated. It may also be dis- 

 tinguished from any variety of the Canada Lynx, (L. Canadensis,) by a 

 white patch behind the ear, which does not exist in the latter. 



This peculiar mark is to be observed, however, in several species of 

 the genus Felis. We have noticed it in the jaguar, royal tiger, pan- 

 ther, ocelot, hunting-leopard, and other species. 



