OCR Text |
Show delivered. This unforeseen event will now give, much sooner than I expected, an opportunity to fulfil my promise to undertake a thorough study of the anatomy of the soft parts, as well as of the two fully-developed foetuses. 14th April, 1904. E X P L AN A T IO N OF PLATE X . Dinomys branickii, from photographs of two living examples (a mother and young) (about xV nat. size), and the skin of the former (about i nat. size) in the Goeldi Museum, Pard. 8. The Black Wild Cat of Transcaucasia. By C. S a t u n i n , of Tiflis, C.M.Z.S. [Received May 16, 1904.] Although the existence in Transcaucasia of a Black Wild Cat was known long ago, the animal has never been described nor scientifically named. Hochenacker speaks of this cat, so far back as 1837*, as a Felis cato affinis; but as all his text is in Latin, this cannot be regarded as a scientific name for the animal. I myself have mentioned this cat as Felis sp. in my paper on the Fauna of the Caucasus +, as well as in the Catalogue of the Caucasian Museum +; but I have not had the opportunity of giving a description of it until now. That it really is a Wild Black Cat I knew well, as all the specimens I have had the opportunity of examining were alike, and as it is by no means rare in its native haunts. There remained one important point to decide about this animal, namely, Was it not a melanic form of the common Wild Cat, Felis catus L. ? Thanks to the material in the Zoological Museum of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, where I have found two mounted specimens, three skins, and three skulls of this cat, I am now certain of its specific validity, and I name it Felis daemon §, of which the following is the description :- Size of a big male domestic cat. Colour ranging from black with a slight reddish tinge to reddish dark brown. This colouring is somewhat lighter on the under side of the body, on the inner surface of the extremities, and on the distal under surface of tail. Yery long white hairs are scantily dispersed all over the body. In a certain light, dark-black transversal stripes are visible on the sides of the fore part of the body, these stripes being more conspicuous on somewhat faded skins. The whiskers, as well as the eyebrow-bristles, are brown. The tail is considerably longer than in Felis catus. Claws white, transparent, and with a mother-of-pearl lustre. * Bull. Soc. Nat, Moscou, 1837, p. 136. t Zool. Jahrb., Syst. ix. p. 289 (1897). J ‘ Museum Caucasicum,' i. p. 24( 1899). § " Daemon " being the hero of everal Caucasian legends, and also of the poemby Lermontoff with the same title 162 ON THE WILD CAT OF TRANSCAUCASIA. [June 7, |