CARNIVORA. 
11 
edge of the jaw, like the other teeth, but a little 
way up the inner inclined surface of it, and takes a 
direction across the lower part of the last carnivorous 
tooth. It is flat at the top, and seems to be intended 
as an anvil to receive the cutting edge of the large 
lobe of the last lower carnivorous tooth, so as to 
render it more available in acting on the food. From 
its situation in the mouth it may easily escape ob- 
servation*; whence it is not unfrequently said, that 
the cats have only three cheek-teeth in each jaw. 
Indeed the tooth in question is so different from the 
others, that it may be considered as auxiliary to 
the rest, rather than as either a carnivorous or molar 
tooth itself ; and this notion is strengthened by the 
observation, that those animals, which have one or 
more tubercular or flat cheek-teeth at the back of 
the mouth, employ them occasionally for masticating 
vegetable food, to which they are in some degree 
inclined ; but this is not at all the case with the 
feline family, nor is the tooth in question, from its 
peculiar situation in particular, at all calculated for 
this purpose t. The second figure on the opposite 
plate is intended to show these auxiliary teeth. 
* Iliger and Cuvier notice it : the former says, Molares ob- 
ducti, fere omnes sectores, supra utrinsecus 4 : antici duo conoidei 
crassiusculi, tertius maximus acie bicuspide, et interius gradu antico 
laterali parvo auctus, quartus tritorius tuberculatus parvus interior 
transversus. Infra utrinsecus 3 : antici duo compressi simplices, 
tertius maximus acie bicuspide.” Cuvier describes it : Le qua- 
trieme dent est tres-petite et placee transversalement en dedans de 
r extremite posterieure de la precedente. Sa couronne est plate.” 
1 1 am not certain that this auxiliary tooth is found in the lynxes. 
