Part 46 (1/2)

NATIVE NAMES.--_Loh_, Kashmiri; _Lomri_, Hindi, at Simla; _Wamu_, Nepalese.

HABITAT.--Throughout the Himalayas.

DESCRIPTION.--Pale fulvous, with a dark brownish or deep chestnut streak down the back; sides deeper fulvous; the haunches a steely grey, mixed with yellowish hairs; tail grey and very bushy, largely tipped with white; ears deep black on outside; cheeks and jowl greyish-white; moustaches black; legs chestnut in front, paling off behind.

SIZE.--Head and body, 30 inches; tail, 19 inches; weight, 14 lbs.

Not at all unlike an English fox, only more variegated. The foregoing description is taken chiefly from a very fine specimen shot in the garden of the house in which I stayed at Simla; but it is subject to great variation, and is in its chief beauty in its winter dress.

Several specimens which I have seen are all more or less different in colour. I have never seen a handsomer fox; the fur is extremely rich, the longer hairs exceeding two inches, and the inner fur is fine and dense. It is said to breed in April and May, the female usually having three to four cubs.

NO. 254. VULPES PUSILLUS.

_The Punjab Fox_ (_Jerdon's No. 141_).

HABITAT.--Punjab Salt Range.

DESCRIPTION.--Similar to the last, but much smaller, being about the size of the Indian fox. Jerdon suggests that it may be a variety of the last species, dwarfed by a warmer climate, but Blyth and others keep it apart.

NO. 255. VULPES FLAVESCENS.

_The Persian Fox_.

NATIVE NAMES.--_Tulke_, at Yarkand; _Wamu_, Nepalese.

HABITAT.--Eastern Turkestan, Ladakh, Persia, and, according to Gray, Indian Salt Range; Thibet.

DESCRIPTION.--Fulvous, darker on back, very similar to _V. monta.n.u.s_, only more generally rufous and paler, with longer hair and larger teeth; face, outer side of fore-legs and base of tail pale fulvous; spot on side of face, chin, front of fore-legs, and a round spot on upper part of hind foot blackish; hairs of tail tipped black; ears externally black; tail tipped largely with white. The skull of one mentioned by Mr. Blanford had larger auditory bullae than either the European fox or _V. monta.n.u.s_.

NO. 256. VULPES GRIFFITHII.

_The Afghanistan Fox_.

This was at first reckoned by Blyth as synonymous with the last, but was afterwards separated and renamed. It is stated by Hutton to be common about Candahar, where the skins are made into _reemchas_ and _poshteens_, the price in 1845 being about six annas a skin.

MARINE CARNIVORA.

We disposed of the land Carnivora in the last article, and now, before proceeding to the Cetacea, I will give a slight sketch of the marine Carnivora, of which, however, no examples are to be found on the Indian coasts. The Pinnipedia or Pinnigrada are amphibious in their habits, living chiefly in the water, but resorting occasionally to the land. There are some examples of the land Carnivora which do the same--the polar bear and otter, and more especially the sea-otter, _Enhydra lutris_, which is almost exclusively aquatic, but these are all decidedly of the quadrupedal type, whereas in the amphibia we see the approach to the fish form necessary for their mode of life.

The skeleton reveals the ordinary characteristics of the quadruped with somewhat distorted limbs. The bones of the forelimbs are very powerful and short, a broad scapula, short humerus and the ulna and radius are stout, parallel to each other, and the latter much broader at the base; often in old animals the two are ankylosed at the joint, which is also the case with the tibia and fibula. The hip-bones are narrow and much compressed, the femur remarkably short, the shank-bones and the bones of the feet very long. In walking on land the feet are, in the case of the _Otaria_ or eared seals placed flat on the full sole; the common seals never use their hind limbs on the sh.o.r.e. The dent.i.tion is essentially carnivorous, but varies considerably in the different families, and even in the _Phocidae_ themselves. The stomach is simple, but the intestines are considerably longer than in the _Felidae_, averaging about fifteen times the length of the body; the digestion is rapid. The bones are light and spongy, and the spine particularly flexible, from the amount of cartilage between the bones. They have a large venous cavity in the liver, and the lungs are capacious, the two combining to a.s.sist them in keeping under water; the blood is dark and abundant.

The brain is large, and in quant.i.ty and amount of convolution exceeds that of the land Carnivores. Their hearing is acute, but their sight out of water is defective.

Their external features are an elongated pisciform body, the toes joined by a membrane converting the feet into broad flippers or fins, the two hind ones being so close as to act like the caudal fin of a fish. The head is flattish and elongated, or more or less rounded, but in comparison with the body it is small. Except in the _Otaridae_ there are no perceptible ears, and in them the ear is very small.

The fur is of two kinds, one long and coa.r.s.e, but the other, or under fur, is beautifully soft and close, and is the ordinary sealskin of commerce. The roots of the coa.r.s.e hair go deeper into the skin than those of the under fur, so the furrier takes advantage of this by thinning the skin down to the coa.r.s.e roots, cutting them free, and then the hairs are easily removed, leaving the soft fur attached to the skin.

The Pinnigrada are divided into three families--the _Trichechidae_, or walruses; the _Otaridae_, or sea-lions or eared seals; and the _Phocidae_, or ordinary seals.

As none of these animals have been as yet observed in the Indian seas, being chiefly denizens of cold zones, I will not attempt any further description of species, having merely alluded to them _en pa.s.sant_ as forming an important link in the chain of animal creation.