THE JAGUAR. 
Felis On^a. Linn. 
Whether the Leopard and the Panther are in reality 
distinct species, and if so on what particular characters 
the specific distinction depends, are questions that have 
been so variously solved by writers of the highest emi- 
nence that we cannot, without better opportunities for 
comparison of specimens than we at present possess, 
adopt the conclusions to which any one of them has 
come upon the subject. Linnseus, not perceiving any 
sufficient grounds of distinction, referred both names to 
one and the same animal ; Buffon added a third, that 
of the Ounce, and increased the confusion by describ- 
ing, as the Panther of the ancients and an animal of 
the Old Continent, the Jaguar which is now known to 
be peculiar to the New ; Cuvier subsequently founded 
a distinction upon the greater or smaller number of 
