Guide to the galleries of mammalia (mammalian, osteological, cetacean) in the Department of Zoology of the British Museum (Natural History).

  • British Museum (Natural History). Department of Zoology.
Date:
1887
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Guide to the galleries of mammalia (mammalian, osteological, cetacean) in the Department of Zoology of the British Museum (Natural History). Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    similar to, the last, of which there are four or five African species, one of them, the Common Genet (G. vulgaris), extending into Europe as far north as Central France. (4) The Palm-Civets (Paradoxurus), long-bodied, short-limbed animals, with short ears, long powerful hairy tails, naked soles, and semi-retractile claws, common in India and the Malay Archipelago. They are arboreal in their habits, and feed either on rats, lizards, small birds and eggs, or on vegetable food, such as rice and fruit. (5) The Mongooses (Herpestes, &c.), of Africa and India, with naked soles, and long, straight, non-retractile claw's. They feed on reptiles and birds, rats and mice, eggs, &c., and are often domesticated for the purpose of clearing houses of vermin. They are most useful in destroying poisonous snakes, whose bites they avoid by their won- derful watchfulness and agility; the stories of their having recourse to some plant as an antidote to the snake^s poison are entirely without foundation. There are about 30 species of Mungooses known, of which the most noticeable are the Egyptian IMungoose (Herpestes ichneumon), which is found also in Spain, and feeds largely on the eggs and young of the crocodile; and the Grey Mungoose (Herpestes griseus), the species tamed in India. Some years ago the latter was introduced into the island of Jamaica, where rats had multiplied on the sugar-plantations to such an extent as to inflict the greatest losses upon the planters, who were nearly ruined. In a short time the Mungooses cleared the plantations of the vermin, and are now under the protection of the law. Allied to the Mungooses are several aberrant animals found in Madagascar, among which may be specially mentioned the curious Eupleres goudoti, exhibited in Case 18, which obtains the beetles and worms on which it lives by burrowing in the earth with its elongated snout. The second Suborder of the Carnivora, the Cynoidea, consists of a single family, the Canidce, or Dogs, M^olves, and Foxes. They are on the whole lightly built animals, of great speed and endurance, obtaining their prey, as a rule, by running it fairly down, rather than by pouncing upon it in the manner of the Cats and their allies. They are digitigrade, and have, with a single exception, five toes on their fore and four on their hind feet; their palms and soles are always hairy, the only naked parts being
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