I happened to get hold of two foxes this week—a fine dog fox and his vixen wife; and among other things, I have been looking up Cowper's glands, the supposed absence of which in the dogs has always "gone agin' me." Moreover, I have found them (or their representatives) in the shape of two small sacs, which open by conspicuous apertures into the urethra immediately behind the bulb. If your Icticyon was a male, I commend this point to your notice.
ITEM.
If you have not already begun to macerate him, do look for the "marsupial" fibro-cartilages, which I have mentioned in my "Manual," but the existence of which blasphemers have denied. I found them again at once in both Mr. and Mrs. Vulpes. You spot them immediately by the pectineus which is attached to them.
The dog-fox's caecum is so different from the vixen's that Gray would have made distinct genera of them.
Ever yours very faithfully,
T.H. Huxley.
4 Marlborough Place, N.W., May 2, 1880.
My dear Fayrer,
I am greatly obliged for the skulls, and I hope you will offer my best thanks to your son for the trouble he has taken in getting them.
The "fox" is especially interesting because it is not a fox, by any manner of means, but a big jackal with some interesting points of approximation towards the cuons.