70 CARNIVORA, 



polecat, &c. The ribs come very low or near to the ossa ilii. The 

 hair is strong and long. The legs are short and strong, similar to those 

 of the badger. The toes are five in number. In the fore-foot the middle 

 toe is the longest, the rest becoming proportionally shorter to the little 

 toe ; but the thumb is shorter in proportion to the fore-toe. In the 

 hind -foot, the middle toe and the ring- toe are of one length. The claws 

 are short, both before and behind, but are pretty broad at their roots. 



It walks on the whole carpus, metacarpus, and toes, in the fore-feet ; 

 but only on the toes and part of the metatarsus of the hind-feet. 



The head is pyramidal, but does not terminate in a very sharp nose 1 . 

 The outline of the head is rather convex. The ears are something like 

 the lion's ; the concha is large. 



Teeth, six incisors ; two tusks ; four cuspidati, the last of which is 

 the largest, and is a little studded backwards at the root with tubers ; 

 two squeezers [carnassials] in the upper jaw, as in the Hon ; but its cor- 

 respondent in the lower jaw has an internal process coming nearer [in 

 shape] to the grinder 2 ; and two grinders, each of which in the upper 

 jaw is out of the line, to be opposite to that of the lower. In the lower 

 jaw the grinders are in the lines, making sixteen in each jaw. The 

 teeth are not long, but strong and round. 



The colour of the animal is dark, striped with a light brown 3 , some- 

 what like a badger. The whole contents of the belly is exactly similar 

 to the ferret. 



A bag on each side of the anus lined with a pretty thick cuticle. 

 The penis passes along the belly as in the ferret, and has a pretty long 

 bone in it. There is hardly any scrotum. The testicles are beyond the 

 sides of the pubis, and are small. 



Query : "What time of the year was it caught ? 



1 ["ft Eostro abbreviate; unguibas maniculorum crassis, &c. M. Zorilla." — 

 Fischer, Synopsis Mammalium, p. 218.] 



2 [This is a character distinguishing the Zorille and Grison ( Galictis) from the 

 European stoats. Hunter's enumeration of the teeth includes those of both sides of 

 the upper jaw. If the reader compare the description with the figure of the molar 

 series of the Galictis vittatam. my ' Odontography,' pi. 128, figs. 1 & 2, he will 

 readily trace the agreement of the description in the text with the characters there 

 shown : fig. 2 exhibits the ' internal ' process, which makes the lower carnassial or 

 ' squeezer ' similar to a grinder. The minute terminal grinder of the lower jaw appears 

 to have escaped Hunter's notice. The dental formula of both Zorilla and Galictis 



. 3—3 1—1 3—3 1—1 o . , 



■ : ~ » i=? e T=i>P & m 2=5 = S 4 -] 



3 [" Mephitis Zorilla, Lichtenstein " — " dark-brown, with four yellowish-white 

 stripes along the back, and one on each side." — Tan der Hoeven, Handbook of 

 Zoology, vol. ii. p. 716.] 



