332 H - gadow, 



unknown. Very local in its distribution it seems to be least rare in 

 the South of Spain, in the Alemtejo and in the Algarve, in vineyards 

 on flat ground, but also in the Asturias, whence Lord Lilford has re- 

 ceived it. : According to him it is called „melon" or „meloncillo". 



Some naturalists are inclined to think that this animal was intro- 

 duced into Spain by the Moors, as a destroyer of raice and rats, and 

 its very local , sporadic occurrence seems to favour that view , but 

 there are several objections. First, the Iberian Herpestes widdringtoni 

 exhibits some slight, but apparently constant diöerences in colour from 

 the North African H. Ichneumon ; and even if these differences be not 

 of specific but only of subspecific or racial importance, it would be a 

 rash attempt to explain them as the immediate result of the intro- 

 duction from Africa into Spain, although it is conceivable that about 

 one thousand years may have produced such changes in a shortlived 

 little mammal, especially if for arguments sake we assume that it was 

 semidomesticated. Secondly, it may be asked, why should the Moors 

 take the trouble of introducing this animal into a country which was 

 already blessed with the domestic cat. Whether the latter was in 

 Iberia before the Romans, or if it was introduced by their legionaries, 

 we do not know, but it is very probable that the Visigoths had do- 

 mestic cats. The Spanish and Portuguese name of these creatures is 

 „gato" , which of course is the same as cat, Katze; and catus is 

 late Latin. Moreover the Spaniards call their cats by exactly the same 

 sound as the Germans, namely by miez-miez! These facts show, I 

 think, that in Spain the cat received and has retained its name and 

 call from the Gothic , but not from the Iberian , the Roman , or the 

 Moorish population. Lastly the very name of Herpestes, namely „Me- 

 lon u is derived from the Latin meles , while there is no name of 

 Moorish origin, and considering the way in which the name clings to 

 nearly everything introduced by the Moors into Spain, it is most un- 

 likely that the Ichneumon should be an exception. 



Concerning the vernacular names of many of the smaller mam- 

 mals, there exists a good deal of local Variation and of uncertainty. 

 For instance Mustela foina, is according to Lord Lilford generally 

 known as „foina", while M. putorius is called „marta". In Galicia 

 they are called „garduna" and „furon" respectively, while „marta" is 

 the term applied to the „geneta" of other parts of Spain. 



„Marta" (with mrt common to all the Roman and Teutonic 

 languages) is of course the same as the German Marder and the Eng- 



