AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES

AMERICAN

MUSEUM

NOVITATES

Publishedby

Number 360 THEAMERICANMUSEUMOFNATURALHISTORY July 17, 1929

New YorkCity

59.9,74 (51)

CARNIVORA FROM THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS

BY GLOVER M. ALLEN

In previouspapers,briefreportsltave been made on theMustelidae and Viverridae secured bythe Asiatic Expeditions under the leadership

of Dr. Roy Chapman Andrews for The American Museum of Natural

History. Theremaininggroups of Carnivoraareheredealtwith,

includ-ing the bears, wolves, foxes, and cats (families Ursidw, Canidae, Felidae) of whichamagnificentseries of skins andskullswasbrought back, ade-quateinsomecasesforatentative revisionofthemany namesappliedto certain easternspecies. The discrimination ofgeographic races among

thelarger predaceousmammals is often difficult. Sufficient seriesfrom a

single region are seldom available for the determination of normal

in-dividual variation in

color,

pattern, or proportions, which has resulted

in the frequent bestowal of new names on a quite inadequate basis. Moreover,largecarnivorousmammals may often haveawideindividual

range, sothat local varieties are not soeasily established as inthe case

of smaller and more sedentary species. So faras

possible,

therefore, I

have attempted to review critically thevarious-names and descriptions involved for the region covered.

Ursidu

Solenarctos

thibetanus (Cuvier)

Ursusthibetanus F.CuVIER, 1824, 'Hist.Nat. d3s Mamm.,' P1. ccxiiiand text. The Asiatic black bear is given generic rank as distinct from the

typicalgenus Ursus on account ofits color (black witha white

crescent

on the

chest),

and the formation of the

plantar pads,

which in the fore

paws have an enormous carpal pad continuous with the palmar pad,

whileof the

digital

pads the first and fifth only are continuous with the latter. The species is forest-living and occurs from India to Man-churia and South China. A number of localraceshavebeennamed, but it must beadmitted that the discrimination ofmost of theserestsupon

'Publications of the AsiaticExpeditionsofThe American Museum of NaturalHistory. Contri-bution No. 91.

AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES

averyslender basis, since nearly all are described from single skulls, often of unknown age or sex and without adequate comparison with the typical form. In these large species not only is the individual and sexual varia-tion in skulls so great as to be readily apparent, but the changes coin-cident with age are also striking. Moreover, these are wide-ranging

animals, and asingleone may travelover more territory in a day than a mouse or shrew would cover in its entire lifetime, a factor tending to prevent thereadydevelopmentoflocal forms. Increasing age is accom-panied by a great increase of zygomatic width, accentuation of the

lambdoid and sagittal crests, and by the enlargement and deepening of the glenoid cavity of the jaw, so that the cranium of an old bear when

placedon aflatsurface rests upontheglenoidportion of the skullor the

paroccipitalprocesses, instead of upon the condyles as itdoes in immature animals. Age is also accompanied by a fusion of thecranialbones, so

thatin adults the outlinesof the frontal, parietal, and finally the nasal bones become quite obliterated.

TheAsiatic Expeditionssecured four skins andskullsofblackbears from the forests near Eastern Tombs, Chihli Province, which are thus

topotypesofS.t.wulsiniHowell. Unfortunately,thesexofnoneof these isknown. Two are immature while the twoothersare adult, the larger perhapsamale. Anadult femalewasalso securedatthe base of Tai Pei

Shan, Shensi, and there are further, available for comparison, four adult skulls from northwestern Corea, Hupeh Province, and "India"

respectively,the last representingtypicalthibetanus. Acareful compari-sonof allthese,andof the descriptionsofmacneilli, mupinensis,and

wul-sinireveals nosinglecharacterwhereby anylocalform of northern China maybedistinguished. Sowerby (1920,Journ. Mamm.,I, p.

213)

has

re-viewedthebearsofeasternAsia,

particularly

withaviewtoidentifying

those described by Heude,

practically

all of which he regards as valid specieswithout recharacterizing them. He admitsthat S. ussuricus is

much like S. thibetanusexceptthatit "seemstohave

longer

haironthe

sides-ofthe head and neck." The chief differenceisbelievedtolieinthe

large size of the last uppermolar, which in Manchurian specimens was 27 mm. long in afemale,31 mm.inamale,against24 mm. in afemale of

thibetanus from the Himalayas and 28 mm. in a specimen representing mupinensis. However, in two skulls

(unsexed)

from India in the Mu-seumof Comparative Zoology, representing

thibetanus,

the

length

ofthis

toothis 27and 33 mm.

respectively.

Inthe Chihli series it variesfrom 28 to 32 mm. Evidently there isnothing

diagnostic

in the size of this toothas aracial character.

Lydekker's macneilli,

from "some distance"

19291

CARNIVORA FROM THEASIATICEXPEDITIONS west of Ta-chienlu, Szechwan, was. supposd to differ in its smaller

cheek teeth, last molar25 by 15mm., but in a skull from Hupeh (M. C. Z.No. 11770) this tooth is 30 mm. long. In S. t.wulsinithe smaller size of the white chin-spot as compared to ussuricus was believed by its

describer to be diagnostic, but the series of topotypes secured by the Asiatic Expeditions shows that this, like most white markings in

mam-mals, is very variable and may be large or small (varying in four skins from 45 to 130 mm. inlength). Inmupinensis it is also said to be very small. It is evident from a study of the available material and descrip-tionsthat individualvariationwillacountfor most of the supposed racial characters in the subspecies described, and that no truly geographic

differenceshave yet been pointed out that will separate the Himalayan

blackbearsfrom those of North China.

SelenarctosthibetanusmelliMatschie

SelenarctosmeUi MATSCHIE, 1922, Arch.f. Naturgesch., A, LXXXVIII, pt. 10, p. 34.

Matschie, in 1922, gave the name melli to ablackbearfrom Kwang-tungProvince, nearCanton,inSouth China. Thetype was captured as acub,and kept for somethreeyears incaptivity,hencemaybepresumed

toshow theusual abnormalitiesof captiveanimals. Itschiefcharacter is said to lie in its small size, for it shows the usual color pattern of S. thibetanus. Afineskinand skull fromChunganhsieninFukien Province wassecuredbyMr. CliffordH.Pope of the ThirdAsiaticExpeditionand mayberegardedasof thesame race. It isan adult malewith the teeth muchwornandall thecranialsuturesquiteobliterated. In sizethe skull aboutequals thatofanadult femalefromShensi, andsinceadult females aresmaller than

maleq,

this may indicatethatmelli is

really

asmaller sub-species of South China. The

single

specimen from Fukien is

obviously

ofmuch less sizethan the

large

skulls of S. thibetanus assumedtobe those of males. The skin, taken in

April,

is in excellent condition and much

shorter-hairedthan the winter skins fromChihli. If this

specimen

ade-quately represents the South China black bear, it seems to indicate a

valid race, characterized byits smallersizeand shorter coat. Mr.

Pope

also secured a very young black-bear cub from the island of Hainan that

doubtlessrepresents thesame animal.

Although long

ago recorded from this island by Swinhoe, no adult

specimens

of the black bearseem to have reached museums fromHainan.

AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES

Canids

COislupus laniger (Hodgson)

LupuslanigerHODGSON, 1847, Calcutta Journ. Nat. Hist., VII, p. 474.

Thewolf of Mongolia andnorthernChina does not seem to be very

different from the typical European race. Three skulls, one of a male, measure about the same asEuropean skulls thoughnone equals in size thelarge Swedishskull, the dimensions of whicharepublished by Miller

(1912,'Mamm.WesternEurope'). In color,the seven skins secured by

the AsiaticExpeditions varyconsiderably accordingto season and con-dition ofwear, but the bestone,killednear Urga,is decidedlypale, the muzzle pale ochraceous-buff grizzled with whitish, forehead slightly

darker, backsof ears and an areaabout theirbases contrastingly

orange-rufous, fore legspale buff without trace of the dark stripe on forearm; neck,body, andtail with the usualochraceous element reduced to buff, thewhiteringsoftheguard hairsprominent. Other Mongolian skinsare

considerably darker: buffy grizzled with black and the forearm stripe

maybe welldeveloped. The underfuristhick andwoolly,in the winter coatespecially. In viewofthevariation in coloramong wolves ofthe.

same region, from pale grayish animals to buff-colored specimens with

greater amounts of black in thepelage, itis

evidently

unwisetorecognize

several speciesamong themasMatschie has

done,

unlessmore essential differences canbe establishedthanthoseshowninthe nativeskins

with-out definite locality which were made by this author the basis of

hi's

Lupusfilchneri andL.karanorensis. Healsonames athird

species.

Lupus tschiliensis, on the basis of a

skull,

sex

unknown,

from

Chihli,

but the

measurements are identical with those of

Mongolian

skulls and the slightdifferences in cranial

proportions

uponwhichhereliesare best re-garded as

purely

individual variations.

Probably

Hodgson's

name

laniger, basedonthe wolfof

Tibet,

is

applicable

to' thewolf of

Mongolia

and North

China,

an animal very little

paler

and smaller than thatof western Europe.

Cuonrutilans

(S. Muller)

Canis rutilansS.MtLLER, 1839,'Verhand.Zool.Zoogd.,'pp.27,51.

Size ofasmall

wolf;

color

bright

rusty

rufous,

the tailblacker witha black

tip;

belly,

throat,

and

edge

ofupper

lip

usually

white.

Two skins from

Yenping,

Fukien

Province,

taken by Rev. H. R.

Caldwell,seem tobethe first definite records for the

province.

They

are notcertainly

distinguishable

incolor fromtwoother

sklihs

frour

western Yunnan

(Namting

River and

Shafun).

One of each

pair

has the

belly

suffusedwith the reddish tint of the back.

1929] CARNIVORA FROM THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS 5 Thetypelocality of this animal isBengal, but probably it is not very

different from the earlierdescribed Cuonjavanicus (Desmarest) of Java, ofwhich it mayeventually provetobethe mainland subspecies.,

Nyctereutes procyonoides (Gray)

Canis procyonoides GRAY, 1834, 'Illustr. IndianZool.,' II, P1.I.

Small,fox-like, with short bushy tail; coloramixtureofbuff,gray,

and black, theblack-tipped hairs predominatingoverthe back andina narrow dorsal line from the crown to the tip of the tail; a conspicuous

blackish-brown patch oneachside of the facefromjust in front of and belowthe eyetoapoint midwaytotheearand continued as anarrower

linebehind theear. Theflanks, sidesofneck, and the tail arechiefly a warmbuff; feet blackish brown.

Gray's

original specimen

wassent by ReevesfromChina, henceno

doubt from near Canton. The large series of some twenty specimens,

collected'mainly

by the'Asiatic Expeditions, includes ten from Fukien Province which may be taken to represent true procyonoides. Three othersfrom easternSzechwan

(Wanhsien)

arequite thesame, as arealso

those from Kiangsu, Chekiang, andHunan Provinces. There isawide variation in coloramong skinsfrom the samelocality, some having the black-tipped hairsofthe backso numerousas todarken thewholeupper

side whileinothers

they

are chiefly confined tothemedian''dorsal line.

The entirepelage ismore orlesssuffused with pale

ochraceous

which is in someskins; intensifiedto a

bright

rusty. Winter skins in good condition

are

longer-furred

than those of summer. A Fukien

specimren

taken in Decembershowstheextremeoftheintensification, in being almost

fox-red all over except for the usual blackish areas and the black-tipped hairsof the dorsal line.

Matschie,in 1908, gave the name stegmanni to the racoon-dog of the

Yangtze basin,

type

locality

Chunkiang, at the same time stating that the N.sinensisofBrass, alsofromtheYangtzeValleywas a synonym of procyonoides. The characters he gives (based on asingle skull) are,

however,

unreliableand do nothold good in the present

series,

sothat

both thesenames are

undoubtedly

synonymsof

procyonoides.

No

speci-mensare athandfromNorth China,sothat itis uncertainifthe

species

varies geographicallyin that part of its range. Matschie

gives'names,

however,to

theslightly

largerUssuri animalaswellastothatfromAmur

Land.

AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES

Nyctereutes procyonoides orestes Thomas

Nyctereutes procyonoides orestes THOMAS, 1923, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., (9) XI, p.657.

Aslightlypaler race. The type was an adult female from the north-western flank oftheLikiangRange of Yunnanand constituted the first record of the genus in western China. Four additional skins (two with

skulls)weresecured from the same range by theAsiaticExpeditions, and

showthat the Yunnan animalis after all verysimilar tothat of south-eastern China, differing chiefly in the gray instead of buff tone to the palerportionsofthe longer hairs, though there may be a very slight suffu-sion ofbuffy. The throat and feet are black in the type but brownish in thefourotherskins, whilethenearly parallelcondition of the zygomatic

arches, which formed the chief basis of separation, is evidently an

in-dividualaberrationsince thetwootherskullsshownothingtodistinguish

them from thoseof the typical race. Thomas mentions the abnormal presence of an upper third molar on the right side in his specimen, a

peculiarity found ontheleft side in aspecimencollected bytheAsiatic Expeditions in eastern Szechwan.

Vulpes vulpes hoole Swinhoe VulpeshooleSWINHOE, 1870, Proc. Zool.Soc. London,p.631.

Similar to the red fox of Europe but the sides and especially the

thighsmore mixedwith gray, the fore feet usually withless black, and

the redtoneslessfulvous but morechestnut. The tailhasthechestnut confined more totheuppersurface; the lowersurfaceis buffy white, its longerhairsblack-tipped. Below, whiteto gray or evenpinkish.

Aseriesof seventeenskins, mostly with skulls,fromFukienProvince

isinstructiveasshowing therange ofindividualvariation in arestricted locality. Although theaverageskinismorechestnutabovewithgrayer

thighsandhasatail thatis paler below, cloudedwith slaty,ascompared withEuropeanredfoxes(Scotlandand

Germany), nevertheless,

thereare occasionalindividualsthatdiffer verylittle indeedfromtheselatter. In

general, theclear chestnut area is confined to a rather narrow median stripe withill-definedboundaries,becomingmorerufousonthe tail. The flanks are bright ochraceous frosted with gray-tippedhairs which

espe-cially predominate onthe sidesof thehaunches. Theblackish area on thesidesofthe muzzle may be welldevelopedorveryindistinctor want-ing altogether. Theblack stripe on the front of the fore

leg

is usually

narrow,bordered byrufous,but may bebroad

enough

tocoverthe entire front of the leg and extend up on the shoulders. In dark

specimens

1929] CARNIVORA FROM THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS 7 the throatand belly are suffused with slaty where the dark bases ofthe

hairsshow through, and in one skin the wearing away of the white tips of the hairs forms an indistinct black collar. Usually a narrow line of clear bright ochraceousruns along the sides bordering the belly. The last is usually white withgrayish underfur, but occasionally the whole underside ofthebodyis deep pinkish buff. In the entire series no skin shows the blackishbellysooften seen inEgyptianor Europeanred foxes.

Swinhoe,however, found this variationinFukienandbelieving it to

repre.

sent anupland race, named it lineiventer. But there can be but little doubtthat all thefoxes of South China are really referable to a single

subspecies to which Swinhoe's first name is applicable, for specimens

securedby the Asiatic Expeditions from Chekiang, Hunan, and Maitai Chao, Shansi, donot show any essentialdifferences. Matschie,in 1908, gaveseveralnames tofoxes from easternAsia,based on skinspurchased infur markets, butprobablymost of theseare synonymsof V. v. hoole

or offorms already describedfrom eastern Tibet. His Vulpes aurantio-luteus,presumedtohavecomefromthe mountains of theupperYangtze,

is doubtless thesame as V. v. hoole, with which itexactly corresponds

inits

description.

The average condylobasal lengthoffour adult males fromFuching, Fukien, is 135.1 mm.,of fourfemales127.8mm.

AbeautifulskinfromLichiang, Yunnan, is unusually deepin color,

the fore andhind feet black, the entire back more fulvous than usual, andthetail much darkenedwithblack. Initsgeneralappearance,

how-ever,itcorresponds with V.v.hoole.

Vulpesvulpes tschilionsis Matschie

VulpestschiliensisMATSCHIE, 1908, 'Wiss. Ergebn.Exped. Filchner, X,'pt. 1, p. 169.

Alargernorthernrace of similar colorationtothe last.

In describing this fox, Matschie supposedthatits chief distinguish-ing feature lay

in

having

the backs oftheearsbrown instead ofblack. Thetypeisamounted

specimen

from

Peking

intheBerlin

Museum,

and mayhave been somewhat

faded,

foranotherskin from thesame

locality,

he says, has theearsblacker.

Asingle skinsecuredbythe Asiatic

Expeditions

fromEasternTombs,

in thesame

province,

canbe

closely

matched

by

oneof the less

grizzled,

fulvous

specimens

from Fukien. It

has, however,

a minimum of black

onthefeet,and lacks any dark markonmuzzle andchin. But its skull is

AMERICAN MUSEUM NO VITA TES

this respect seems to agree so well with the cranial measurements given

byMatschie, thatit mayperhapsrepresent a distinct northeasternrace and I am therefore retaining Matschie's name for it. The condylobasal

length is157 mm.,which is22mm. greaterthan the average of four male skulls from Fukien. Skulls from Shensi and Shansi are of intermediate

sizeto148 mm.forcondylobasallength.

This skull is but little inferior in size to one recorded by Ognev from

southern Ussuri, eastern Siberia, under the new name dolichocrania,the greatest lengthofwhich isgiven as 167.1 mm., while the samedimension

(occiput tofront of incisors) in the Eastern Tombs skull (A. M. N. H. No. 57070) is 165 mm. Itmay,therefore, prove that tschiliensis ranges totheUssuriregionandthatOgnev'sdolichocrania is a synonym of it.

Vulpes vulpes?karagan (Erxleben)

CaniskaraganERXLEBEN, 1777, 'Syst.RWgneAnim.,' p. 566.

Apallid form, straw-yellow, with rusty on back, neck and shoulders; the pawsstraw-yellow, withorwithout black marking.

The collection contains an adult male skin and skull from Tsagan

Nor, askull fromLoh, and two young from Tze Tzen Wang, Mongolia, aswellas askinfromtheTianshanRange,but allthese skinsarein such

poorconditionofpelagethroughwearand moult,that theirtrue

colora-tion is undeterminable. The feet and noses of the adults, however, appear to be much paler in color than in the more southern foxes of

China, so that the specimens doubtless represent a more pallid race,

probably closetoV.v.karaganoftheKirghiz Steppe. Inhisrecentreview

ofthe foxes of Russia, Ognev mentions askin collected by Koslov near

Kiakhta and another from the steppes of southern Transbaikalia that

seempractically

indistinguishable

fromthisrace,but itisnotclearthat

the additionalforms he names as V. v.ochroxantha

(Tian-Shan)

and V.v. jakutensis (south ofYakutsk) are really very different. I am therefore

provisionally regardingthe Mongolian red fox as V. v. karagan.

Felidw

Felis bergalensis bengalensis Kerr Felis bengalensisKERR, 1792, 'AnimalKingdom,' p. 151.

A dozen skins from Lichiang and Wei-shi, Yunnan, are referred to the typical race of the small spotted

tiger-cat which,

according

to Wroughton, is found in India from southern Beluchistan to

Upper

BurmaandTenasserim. Althoughaboutthesize ofahousecat,it may at once bedistinguished bythe

pale

markonthe middle third of the back

19291

CARNIVORA FROM THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS of the ear and by the absence of a dark tip to the tail. Its essential patternconsists of

stripes

andspots on anochraceousground, as follows: two narrow black stripes, one from the posterior ccrnerof the eye, the

otherfromjustbelowtheeye, passback along the side of the jaw

enclos-ingawhite areabetweenthem; thelower stripe is more or less continu-ousacross the upper throat with the corresponding one of the opposite

side andthere are three orfourother imperfect blackish-brown

collar-marks onthe lower throat; a short white stripe borders the inner and upper edge of the eye; four narrow black stripes run from the upper cornerof the eyestotheshoulders, with sometimesanarrowmedianone onthe forehead andcrown; thetwo outerofthesebecome broader

pos-teriorly breakingup into large lengthwise blotches over the shoulders;

theinner pair likewise becomes interrupted at the shoulders, but from

thereis traceableasanearlycontinuous pairofstripestotherootofthe tail; thesidesof thebodyaremarkedby about fivelongitudinalrows of

elongate spots which may be all black, or more or less surrounded by

ferruginous, orthe anterior partof the spot may be ofthelatter color, the

posterior

partblack. These markingsarelargerinthemalesthan in females. The belly has a number of blackish-brown spots on a white ground. The tail is buffywithten ormorebrokenringsofblackish.

In the Yunnanseries, the ground color is bright buff or yellQwish,

sharply

markedofffromthe belly which is white. Thereisagood deal offerruginous onthe shoulder region, notonly tinging theground color

butbroadly

edging

the spots and markings. In extremespecimens the body spots may be

chiefly

bright

rusty

slightly

and

incompletely

bor-dered with black, while at theoppositeextreme are skins in which the ferruginous is nearly

suppressed,

so that the markings are nearly all blackonanochraceous-buff ground. Tothis lattertypebelongstheskin described as Felisanastasix bySatunin, asLonnberg has

recently

inti-mated.

Felisbengalonsis chinensis Gray

Feli8chinen8isGRAY,1837,Mag. Nat.Hist.,I, p.577.

Similar to thetypical race in allrespects but the back is less clear ochraceous,withadecidedgraytinge, andthe flanks aregrayish.

Thecollections

include

alargeseries ofsomeithirty skinsandnearly

as many

skulls

from eastern Szechwan

(Wanhsien),

Hunan

(Yochow),

Fukien

(Futsing'And

Yenping),

Hainan

(Nodoa),

andafewother

places.

They allagreein thesomewhat

grayish

tinttobackandsidesinstead of theclear warmbuffto ochraceous of the

typical

animal. There is much

AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES

variation in the pattern and size of the markings. Males are larger,

with larger markingsthan females, and in old age the skulls have a low sagittal crest formed by the union of the temporal ridges, whereas in none of the females seen doesthis ridge form. Peculiarities of the teeth are the frequent loss of the first upper premolars and in the upper carnassial

(p4) theantero-internallobe is often much reduced in size or it may even

(as inacasenotedby L6nnberg) be practically suppressed. In old ani-malstheorbitmay beclosed by the fusion of the postorbital process with

the ascending process ofthejugal.

Milne-Edwards's Felisscriptais either based on this subspecies whose

variation in markings is so deceptive, or it may possibly represent a

slightly darkerrace. Probably also that author's F. microtis from near

Peking is onlyasmallfemale ofthesame, for the supposed reduction of

theearsis said byElliot, who examined the type (andspelled the name

macrotis),tobefallacious,for they arereallyof normalsize. A large skin,

perhaps of a male somewhat stretched, but probably representing the same animal, became the basis of Milne-Edwards's F. decolorata, also from nearPeking. It may later provethat the tiger-catof NorthChina

isadistinctrace,inwhichcasethenamemicrotiswill be available for it,

provided this in turn is not identical with Radde's F. undata of Amur Land,which isat most ageographicalrace of

bengalensis.

Inthelackof

comparable material from North China, however, this point cannot be settled now.

Felis temmincki dominicanorum P. L. Sclater

Felisdominicanmrum P. L.SCLATER, 1898, Proc. Zool. Soc.London, p. 2, PI. i.

About twice the size of a house cat, yellowish brown to

gray-ishbrownabove, thecrown,neckand mid-line of the backbright

ferru-ginous; twoshort white lines fromthe innercornerofthe eyes continue asdull graylinestothe top of

head;

awhiteline from

just

below the eye tosideofneck, borderedabove andbelow

by

russetandblack; backs of ears black mixed with gray centrally; a clear gray patch behind ear;

feetgrizzledgray; tail like the

back,

withablack

tip

and whitish lower

medianline; bellywhitish witha rowof darkspotsoneach side.

Fourhandsomespecimensofthiscat weresecuredby Popein north-westernFukien. Its rangenodoubtismore orless continuousacrossthe

wooded mountainousparts ofsouthern China toNepal and the Malay

Peninsula. The type

locality

of F.temminckiis Sumatra butno

compari-sonsseem tohave been made between Sumatran

specimens

and those of

China, though

Lonnberg

has shown that a skull from northern Siam is

1929] CARNIVORA FROM THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS 11

practically identical in measurements with one from China. An adult

skullfrom Nepalis slightly smaller with more inflated bullae.

Lydekker in 1908 gave the name Felis temminckii mitchelli to the

animal of Szechwan on the basis of a single skin, and in 1924 Sowerby

describedaspecimenfrom Tengyueh, Yunnan, as F. t. bainesi. Inview

ofthevariationin color among cats, and the fact that the species,likeF. aurata of West Africa, believed to be closely related, occurs in a rufous and a browner phase, it is likely that these are not valid races. Matschie's

Felis (Catopuma)melli isundoubtedly a synonym of F. t. dominicanorum, as well as F. t. badiodorsalis A. B.

Howe1j,

proposed in place of melli,

preoccupied.

Inadditiontothe four typicalspecimens secured at Kuatun, Fukien,

byMr. C. H. Pope,heobtainedafifth (an adult female) from the same

locality which agrees in size and in cranial characters with these but

differsremarkablyin that, insteadofbeingwithout markings on the body,

it hasa distinct colorpattern of stripesand spots. Like usual skins of

temmincki, it has blackears, slightlygrizzled with gray in themiddle of

theirposteriorside,acleargraypatchbehindeach ear,grizzledgrayfeet,

and bright ferruginous shoulders and mid-dorsal area. The head and

body,however,aremarked

with

apatternpracticallyidentical with that

ofFelisbengalensis. Thereare two narrowlines of black down theback withalessclearly marked pairexternal tothem,then about four rows of elongateblotchesand spots,eachwithanochraceouscenterincompletely ringed byabrokenblackmargin,heavier attheposterior side. Arowof blackishspots

is

presentoneach sideofthebelly. Thetail, in addition

totheusual pattern offerruginous above, white below, withablack

tip,

alsohasaboutfifteen blackbars, muchasin thesmallerspecies. At first sight, this animal mightbethoughtahybrid betweenF.t.dominicanorum

andF.b.chinensis, bothofwhichoccurtogether here,although the latter iscommoner at lower altitudes, but it seems equally

probable

that it

representseitherareversiontoa moreprimitive

striped

and

spotted

con-ditionora retention ofthe pattern that is probably characteristic of babyhood.

Folisnebulosa Griffith Felis

nebulowg

GRIFFITH, 1821, 'Descr. Vert.,' p. 37.

Size of a

leopard;

the

grayish-ochraceous ground

color has some four or fivelargeblotchesonthe

sides,

eachoutlined in

black,

forming

a rimthatisnarrowerorbrokenontheanterior

side;

forehead withmany

AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES [No. 360 whence the medianpair continues more or less broken on to the base of

tail; belly white withelongate blackish spots.

Askin fromYenping, Fukien, and another, smaller with the black marks less developed, from Hainan, represent this specibs. The slight

differences in color and pattern are probably individual, and since

Griflith'stype was an animal supposed to have come from near Canton,

the Fukien skinmaybe regarded as typical, and Matschie's Felis

(Neo-felis)mellifromKwangtung a synonym. Material is lacking to determine the status of theSumatrananimal towhichHorsfield gavethe name F. macrocelis.

Felis pardusperniger (Hodgson)

Leopardus perniger HODGSON, 1863, 'Cat. Mamm. Nepal,' p. 3.

ThetypelocalityofLinnaus'sFelis pardushas been fixed by Thomas asEgypt, and Hollister shows thatskins fromthe southern part of that country are ochraceous buff, hence somewhat pallid, in ground color.

African leopards seem to be either large-spotted or small-spott6d, the latter perhaps the more usual condition. The series of eleven from

Fukien and eastern Szechwan, secured by the Asiatic Expeditions, are

uniformly rich ochraceousingroundcolor, withapattern oflargespots.

There is a spinal series of large black spots forming two rows, while laterally the spotsbecome more nearly circular, either with ochraceous

centerscompletelyringed,orwith therings broken

anteriorly

orintwoor threeplaces. Immature specimens arepalerincolorthan adults.

Although variousnameshave beengiventoleopards in the East, it

can hardly be said that any of them rests upon a

satisfactory

basis. Cabreka has

pointed

outthatHodgson's Leopardus perniger, basedon a melanistic individual from Nepal, is the oldest name available for an

Indianleopard, and since it is likely that the animalofSouth China is the same, I am provisionally using it for the latter. Three leopard skullsfromIndia

(two

from

Amballa)

are alittle differentintheform of

the nasalsfrom theChinese

series,

inwhich these bonesare

slightly

more flattened and triangular,

tapering

to a median

point

behind instead of maintaining their width farther back and ending inanabruptly rounded outline. These differences are slight, however, and may not hold in a larger series of Indian skulls. Other available names for the eastern leopardare: melas of Wronand

va7iegata

of

Temminck,

both based on

specimens from Java, Matschie's Panthera hanensis basedonskins from

Hing-an-fu and Felis pardalis sinensis of Brass

applied

to

leopards

of

South China. The likelihood

is,

however,

that the latter do not materi-12

1929] CARNIVORA FROM, THE ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS 13 ally differ from Indian examples. Although specimensfromNorth China are not avallable to determine the validity of the race currently called fontanieri (typelocality Peking), Cabrera has suggested that the name

orientalis of Schlegel (type from Amur) maybe found applicable to it instead.

FellstigrisLinnaeus

FelistigrisLINNA:US, 1758, 'Syst.Nat.,' 10thEd.,I, p. 41.

Three handsome tiger skins with skulls, from Fukien Province, do not seemtodifferessentiallyfrom theonlyIndian tiger available for com-parison. The threearesimilarintheir richtawnyground-color,but differ inthedetails oftheblackstripes. Inthe adultmale, No. 45519, the body stripes are broad, and much broken into lozenge-shaped blotches, with

wide borders enclosing a bright rufous center. The stripes on the hips

and haunches are, however, clear, wide, and continuous. Asecond skin

showsthe opposite extreme, withvery narrow stripes,muchless broken

overthe body,buttendingtobe shortorincomplete; whilethe third is

somewhat intermediate, with the stripes more broken and tending to

formblotchesopen ontheanterior upper part, enclosingareasof tawny.

Hilzheimer

(1905,

Zool.Anz.,

XXVIII,

p.

594),

incomparingfive Chinese

tigerskulls with threefromIndia, believed that the Chinese skulls could

bedistinguished by having thehighest point of the skull

just

aheadof the postorbitalprocessesinsteadofover

them,

and

by

lacking

asmall

antero-external

supplementary

cusponthe upper

carnassial,

present in Indian skulls. These differences donot seem to hold

good, however,

for inthe three skulls from Fukien the

highest

point is behind the

postorbital

process in one, ahead of it in the two others, while the

supplementary

cuspletof the uppercarnassialiswell

developed

inthe

large male, slightly

devclopedinthesecond specimenandnot atall in the third.

Hilzheimer,

relyingonthe reportofanexpert furdealer, believed thatthere are

differ-ences in pelage between the Indian and the South China tigers, but it seemsdoubtfulifthese areofrecognizable valuein

nomenclature,

sothat for thepresentHilzheimer'snameamoyensisforthe

tiger

fromYunnanto Fukienmay be

regarded

as

probably

asynonym.

Following Pocock,

I retainthe generic name Felis for thetigerand the

leopard,

although

both

may beincluded in a subgenus, Panthera.

Lynx lynx isabellina (Blyth)

FelisisabeUina BLYTH,1847, Journ.AsiaticSoc. Bengal,XVI,p. 1178.

A large short-tailed cat, of a

general

frosted reddish

above,

white

14 AMERICAN MUSEUM NOVITATES [No. 360

sides ofbelly; legs and flanks with indistinct reddish spots; a broad

white border to the eyelid, interrupted by a black spot near posterior upper margin; cheeks with three or four indistinct stripes of reddish

brown; upper half of ear, itsterminal pencil, ablack spot onthelower cheek, andthe tipof thetail, black.

Alargeskinfromfifteen miles northeast ofUrga,Mongolia,is inter-esting as perhaps marking nearlythe southern boundary of this lynx's

range inthispartofMongolia, where the coniferousforestand its north-emfauna reach the

edge

of the Gobi Desert.