430 



MR. R. I. POCOCK ON THE EXTERNAL CHARACTERS 



described by Blumenbacli * and Pohl f. It is about 4 inches 

 long and slightly incrassate at the base, flattened and grooved 

 beneath throughout its length and carinate above in its proximal 

 half, then flattened and depressed, with a median dorsal groove 

 up to the tip, which is straight or slightly upturned and expanded 

 laterally into a roughened disc with semicircularly curved free 

 margin. This apex is perfectly symmetrical, and an elongated 

 slit perforating the bone behind the tip suggests that the latter 

 results from the fusion of two short terminal processes. 



In the female the area around the genitalia is smooth ; the 

 genital orifice is a little below the naked rim of the circumanal 

 sac, and opens at the summit of an inferiorly expanding groove, 

 which ends in an angular prepuce, forming a glandular space round 

 the small clitoris, which is strengthened with a small bone. 



In Taxidea there is no trace either of the deep pouch imme- 

 diately beneath the tail or of the shallower depression in which 

 the anus is sunk. The anus, on the contrary, is protuberant, 

 and in profile view stands a.way from the base of the tail above 

 and from the perineal region below like a hemispherical moundj. 

 The anus opens just below the centre of this elevation, and the 

 two anal glands, about the size of a hazel-nut, open within the 

 orifice, the ducts traversing a definite papilla as in Mephitis. 

 The secretion is colourless with a sweetish, not unpleasant 

 musteline odour. 



Below the anal prominence there is in the female a long naked 

 perineal area, terminating inferiorly in a piriform prominent 

 vulva, with the orifice above and a somewhat acuminate clitoris 

 below. On each side of the vulva, a little below the level of the 

 orifice, there is a glandular pocket about 6 mm. deep, from the 

 bottom of which arise a few setae, each planted in a shallow 

 pit. 



Thus the anal and genital areas of the female Taxidea differ 

 profoundly from those of Meles §. 



I have had no opportunity of examining a male Taxidea ; but, 



* Handbuch vergl. Auat. 1824, p. 476. 

 t Jena. Zeitschr. xiv. p. 385 (1909). 



X Coues's statement {torn. cit. \). tliat "tlie perinoeal region shows, imme- 

 diately beneath the root of the tail, a large transverse fissure leading into the 

 peculiar subcaudal pouch of the Ilelince " is erroneous; and the error arose probably 

 from the examination of dried skins, which were apparently all the material available 

 for examination, judging from the bottom paragraph on i). 68 of the volume cited. 



§ It is possible, however, that the ditference in the size and situation of the 

 genital orifice in the specimens examined may be more apparent than real. The 

 examples of Meles were wild caught animals, one of which was known to have 

 liroduced young before capture. The example of Taxidea, on the contrary, was 

 received from New York as an adult specimen in 1910, and died, when an old 

 animal, in Dec. 1918. Of her history previous to her arrival in London I know 

 nothing, but she never bred nor was seen to pail" with the male after coming to the 

 Gardens ; and it may be that the small size and low position of the genital orifice 

 and the consequent length of the perineal area are attributable to failure of copulation 

 and parturition. 



