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Show 1899.] ON T H E L E O P A R D O F T H E CAUCASUS. 795 Nyasa. The female has been mounted, and agrees generally with the description of the type. Thus, contrasted with a typical female Puku, it is of smaller size, with the crown of the head blackish, more black on the ears, aud the general colour of a deeper red. There are, however, whitish riugs on the fetlocks, which are stated to be absent in the type. The male apparently differs from the typical Puku chiefly in its smaller dimensions, the head and ears not showing an increase of black. As Barotse-land is not very far from the upper Loangwe valley, there is no reason why the same form of Antelope should not inhabit both localities; and I cannot regard the above-mentioned difference in respect to the light rings on the fetlocks as of more than individual or local importance. In all characters the animal is essentially a Puku, of which I regard it merely as a subspecies, and accordingly prefer to call it the Senga Puku, G. vardoni senganus, instead of C. senganus. 6. On the Leopard of the Caucasus. By R. LYDEKKER. [Received June 5, 1899.] (Plate LIV.) In his recently published work entitled ' Hunting Trips in the Caucasus,' Prince Demidoff states that the Snow-Leopard (Felis undo) occurs in the Caucasus; and he figures (p. 85) an animal which is undoubtedly that species. I am informed, however, that the specimen from which that figure was taken is not of Caucasian origin. And as I find that Dr. Satunin1 especially denies the occurrence of the Snow-Leopard in tbe Caucasus, I have endeavoured to make out what animal had been mistaken for it. Dr. Satunin records the occurrence of the ordinary Leopard in the range, but without stating whether Caucasian examples differ from ordinary Indian Leopards on the one hand or from African Leopards on the other. But since the so-called Felis tulliana of Valenciennes occurs in Asia Minor 2 and also in Persia 3, and bearing in mind the approximation to the Ounce exhibited by that variety of the Leopard, nothing would seem more likely than it should also be found in the Caucasus. In confirmation of this view, I have recently received through the good offices of Messrs. Rowland Ward, Ltd., a Leopard-skin from the Caucasus belonging to Prince Demidoff. Compared with an ordinary Indian Leopard this skin (Plate LIV.) is at once distinguishable by the irregular formation and small size of the rosettes, in which the centres are not appreciably darker 1 Zool. Jahrb., Syst. ix. p. 290 (1896). 2 See Danford and Alston, P. Z. S. 1880, p. 51. 3 See Blanford, * Fauna of British India,' Mamrn. p. 69 (1888); the so-called Ounce skins referred to by the same author in his ' Eastern Persia,' vol. ii. p. 35 (1875), also doubtless belong to the form described as F. tulliana. |