Quadrupeds, 2439 



aquaticus and biguttatus, Helophorus granulans, Prosternon holosericeus, Ctenicerus 

 cupreus and Selatosomus seneus. On the wood sage (Teucrium scorodonia), Adimo- 

 nia halensis ; and crawling on their grassy pathways, Galeruca tanaceti and Timarcha 

 coriaria, in the wildest profusion. 



The entomologists here have hitherto confined their investigations to one of these 

 elevations ; and as there are several others of a precisely similar description, we may 

 hope, by an industrious search, to bring many valuable insects to light as yet unknown 

 in the fauna of this district. — Frederick Bates; King Street, Leicester, April 3, 1849. 



Partiality of Cats for Cigars. — As the pages of the ' Zoologist' have lately pre- 

 sented many interesting notices of the partiality of cats for Nemophila insignis, I am 

 emboldened to offer a fact which lately came under my notice, and which appears to 

 me to be no less interesting. I had placed a box of cigars upon a table, on which was 

 seated in Grimalkin majesty a tabby cat. Happening to turn my head for a minute 

 or two, I heard the lid of the box rattling behind me, and upon looking round to dis- 

 cover the cause, beheld Puss displacing the same with her nose. What next? thought 

 I. The lid was soon pushed off upon the table, and the cat took her seat at the side 

 of the box as contentedly as she would have done at a saucer of new milk. She then 

 proceeded (purring all the while) to smell the contents — these appearing to be much 

 to her satisfaction, she rubbed her head among them, and ended with licking them 

 without the least regard as to which end underwent the operation. This mode of pro- 

 ceeding, however, was not much to my taste, however much it may have been to 

 Pussy's. So the box was withdrawn. In the evening I again (to make sure) put 

 some cigars before her, and again they were subjected to the saliva operation. I do 

 not recollect having seen in the ' Zoologist ' any similar notice, and, therefore, think- 

 ing it might not be uninteresting to some of your readers, have been tempted to place 

 this anecdote at your disposal. I may add, that on some lighted tobacco being placed 

 near her she avoided it, as being probably too pungent. — Windsor Hambrough ; Earl 

 Soham, Suffolk, April 4, 1849. 



Cat Chirurgery, fyc. in Spain. — Nov. 13 (Seville). The orange groves very beau- 

 tiful ; gathering and packing for England were going on. Brouse (our Newfound- 

 land dog) not quit of his cat-hunting propensities — missing him for a moment, Puss 

 on the top of an almond-tree, intimated too truly that he was at the bottom. At 

 Cadiz earless and tailless cats swarmed ; and I was perpetually in hot water : but 

 Brouse would not condescend to hunt these mutilated animals. In Spain the panacea 

 for feline maladies appears to be the docking of the tail (one joint at each successive 

 indisposition) : so that you may always judge of a cat's constitution by the state of its 

 caudal extremity. 



Feb. 22 (Malaga). Cats very noisy i emitting such sounds as none but Malaga 

 cats (I should think) are capable of producing — said to do so always during the 

 months of January and February, explained by their " teething."— Charles A. Bury; 

 Cheshunt, Herts, April 19, 1849. 



Occurrence of the Wild Cat in Surrey. — Chalcroft once had the extraordinary 

 luck to trap a wild cat, the rarest of British quadrupeds : not an old Tom turned 

 poacher, as some of my readers will at once conclude, but a true, genuine wild cat. — 

 Letters of Rusticus, page 6. 



