ON INDIAN CIVETS. 479 



margin of the couch, helix freely exserted from the scull, and capable 

 consequently of free lateral motion ; softly furred behind and on the 

 margin before or within ; the couch and auditory passage hid by longer 

 soft hairs springing from the anteal and attached portion of the helix ; 

 neck and body moderately elongated and full, especially towards the 

 buttocks ; tail rather more than half the length of the animal, furred 

 like the body, thick, and gradually tapering from the base ; limbs short, 

 fine, strictl} digitigrade, five-toed before and behind, the two centrals 

 longest and equal ; the two laterals shorter and equal ; the fifth or 

 thumb very small, but not elevated, being placed close to the edge of 

 the main rest or pad of the foot, and touching the ground with its own 

 little pad ; toes short, and connected by a furred membrane to posteal 

 edge of terminal pads, which are soft and nude : main pad trigonocor- 

 date, full soft, nude, and extending forwards to ends of first phalanges 

 of the digits ; a small metacarpal tuberosity behind the limb ; but no 

 metatarsal one ; nails or talons subfeline and partially retractile, but 

 except in youth blunt and worn by constant attrition with the earth, to 

 which these animals are exclusively confined, and are thus distinguished 

 by habits, as well as structure, from the small vermiformed and scan- 

 sorial species (Indica et Rasse of authors) equally common throughout 

 India, which I have separated under the subgeneric term of Viverrula. 



" The greater species are as frequent in the mountains as in the 

 plains ; the lesser vermiformed species are found only in the latter, and 

 in every part of them. In both the peculiar odoriferous apparatus is 

 fully and equally developed, and each has besides a foetid anal apj3a- 

 ratus analagous to that of My dam ursitaxus, &c. consisting of two solid 

 glai.dular bodies placed centrally on either side the anus, just within 

 its external margin, and opening on either side by a palpable pore 

 whence pressure sends forth a marrowlike offensive secretion ; essen- 

 tially similar glands aud pores are found in the Maries flavigula and 

 others of the foetid genera of this family ; but it has not been noticed 

 that they exist in the true Civets, in addition to their peculiar organs, 

 which last as to position are pubic or preputial, as in the Paradoxuri, 

 and also in Mosclius, or the Musk Deer, a very noticeable circumstance ! 



" The peculiar glands of the Civets when dissected from the skin, 

 are found to be not rounded bodies but flat ones, each (in Orientalis vel 

 melanurus) 2^ inches long by 1-j broad, a congeries of glands like a 

 cauliflower exactly. Cuvier asserts that the Genets, to which our lesser 

 Indian Civets are so much allied in size and form, have this peculiar 

 odorous apparatus only in any evanescent or rather incipient state ; and 

 as I cannot doubt his assertion (the type of Genetta being common in 

 France) it follows that our lesser species are not, as alleged, Genets, for 

 they have this apparatus as complete as the large or true Civets. I have 

 therefore separated the smaller Civets, and constituted them a new 

 group, which is equally distant from Viverra on one side and Genetta on 

 the other. 



