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Show 1877.] MR. D. G. ELLIOT ON FELIS TIGRINA. 705 F. macroura, as its name implies, has for the most part relied upon the length of its tail to establish its claim to a distinctive rank ; and so far as I can discover, leaving aside some slight differences of colour, F. mitis must be recognized by having a tail intermediate in length between F. macroura and F. tigrina. Although I have carefully examined and compared specimens of the alleged species in most of the large collections in Europe aud also in that of the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, I had been utterly unable to find any reliable character to distinguish them from each other. O n a recent visit to London (one of the chief objects of making which was to further investigate this subject) in company with m y friend Mr. E . R. Alston, who was occupied with the Felidae inhabiting Central America, I examined anew the entire collection of these so-called three species, consisting of skins, mounted specimens, and skulls, contained in the British Museum. These are, in all, nineteen specimens, coming from various localities between Honduras on the north, and Paraguay on the south. As the length of tail was a principal character, especially for F. macroura, this member was our first consideration ; and it very soon proved to be, as I had always found was the case, thoroughly unreliable ; for the tails were of all possible lengths, irrespective of locality, and if arranged in a series would exhibit a gradual progression from the shortest to the longest and most pretentious. The next step was the arrangement of the spots or rings, mindful of Dr. Gray's descriptions of rings distinct and rings indistinct. Both kinds were found; in fact a third style was discovered ; for, while some had tails incompletely ringed, and others tails with some perfect rings, others, again, had spotted tails without any tendency at all to form any kind of ring. N o two were exactly alike, even from the same place, while others from far distant localities bore a more general resemblance to each other than some that had the same habitat. As to colour, one had but to choose the shades of buff or grey that pleased him best; for apparently all were represented, and it was difficult to find the same hue on two individuals. The tails proving to be miserable failures in every way for specific distinction, we next turned our attention to the bodies and heads, and were at once met with the same difficulties ; for the animals had as great a disregard for uniformity in the colour of their fur and in the patterns of the markings on their bodies as they evidently had for that on their tails. All hues of grey and buff were exhibited, every shape and size of spots were there, some solidly black, others with light centres and black edges, scattered about separately or coalescing and forming stripes, but without regularity of pattern, and no two examples exactly alike from any or all localities. It was very evident that if there really did exist three species there must be some other means to distinguish them; for of all the characters that had been given of the colour and style of markings, it was very evident that none were of any value whatever ; and as a last resort we turned to the skulls. Here, also, our efforts met with no better success; for variations |