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Show 194 PROF. ST.-GEORGE MIVART ON THE ALUROIDEA. [Feb. 7, Una; but is a character which is commonly present in the Herpestina. The remarkable os penis of Cryptoprocta is certainly a very distinctive character ; but the generative apparatus of Hyana crocuta is far more so, and no one would on that account raise that animal to the rank of even a subfamily. Moreover it is interesting to note that while the os penis is so small and so often absent in the Viverrina, "il n'en est pas de m e m e dans les Mangoustes; il y est meme assez developpe"1-an assertion confirmed by the figures on De Blainville's plate 9 : it is equally developed in Herpestes palu-dinosus. The claws are strongly arched (cf. fig. 14 F, p. 192). As regards the teeth of Cryptoprocta, they are, as every one knows, extremely feline; but the longer I live, the more convinced am I that dental characters are valueless as indices of affinity, save as existing in closely allied forms-the different species of one genus. Amongst the Viverrida we have seen how little the dental peculiarities of Arctogale, Arctictis, and Cynogale tell against the weight of other characters ; the exceptional teeth of Gulo, amongst the Mustelida, teach the same lesson; and, as I shall shortly endeavour to point out, what I believe to be the affinities of Proteles to Hyana and of Hyana to Herpestes very strongly reinforce it. Cryptoprocta, when first described (Trans. Zool. Soc. i. p. 137, plate 21), was ranked by Mr. Bennett, its describer, amongst the Viverrida. De Blainville, in recognizing this affinity as especially justified by the milk-dentition, regarded it as especially allied to Crossarchus. He has figured the young skull and the milk-dentition2. The osteology of Cryptoprocta has been carefully described and figured by Alphonse Milne-Edwards and Alfred Grandidier in the Ann. des Sc. Nat. 1867, p. 314, pis. 7-10. The animal has also been described, and various details as to its habits given, by Messrs. Pollen and Van D a m in their ' Faune de Madagascar' (1868), p. 13. Skeletons and two skins exist in the British Museum ; and there is a skeleton in that of the Royal College of Surgeons. The length of the head and body of the largest specimen in the British Museum is about 81"*3, that of the tail 73"*7. The body is of one colour. The claws are sharp, very curved, and semicoiitractile; the tarsus and metatarsus is naked. The skull has an auditory bulla, which is neither distinctly Herpestine nor Viverrine; it is more prominent than in Paradoxurus. The alisphenoid canal is constant3. The pterygoid fossa is very small. The external opening of the auditory meatus is rounded and of moderate size. The postorbital processes of the frontal are rather small, and very distant from the exceedingly small malar processes. The skull is but little pinched in behind the orbits. The condyloid foramen is more or less concealed. The cranial ridges are rather strongly developed. The paroccipital process is long, but not depending. The mastoid is well marked, and more developed than in 1 De Blainville, ' Osteographie,' Viverra, p. 39. 2 Osteog. Yiverras, pis. 6 & 12. 3 Present in all the specimens I have examined. |
