Both the Old and New World are well stocked with Cats. Everywhere they are the correlates, geographically speaking, of the beautiful forms of the Herbivora, and are their natural checkmates in the earth-peopling process. Their terrible office is to cull out the surplus number of Goats, Antelopes, Deer, Oxen, and Sheep; they also are not good neighbours to the Monkey tribes, nor to Rats, Cavies, Hares, Squirrels, and other gnawing animals. The smaller Cats also add feathered game to their diet. Everywhere they are the terror of woodland and of field, of plain and of forest. All are of the kindred of the Lion, and, like him, all “go about, seeking whom they may devour.”
Man has half tamed one of the smallest—we say half tamed, for does not the demon that possesses all Cats still only slumber in the heart of the tamest domestic variety? As for the Hunting Leopard, he is deceived in the services he renders, and, in his own mind, is hunting for himself, and not for his master.
It is only necessary to mention the animals belonging to this noble family of “gentlemen caterers” to assure oneself that in it are contained the best known, the most skilled, the most perfectly armed of all the Carnivorous order. We have the Wild Cats existing under many forms nearly all over the world, the Lion the great tyrant of Africa, the Tiger the despot of India, the Puma and Jaguar taking their place in America, the Leopard helping the work of the Lion and Tiger in Africa and Asia, the Lynxes found in both Old and New Worlds, and the Cheetah, or Hunting Leopard of Asia and Africa. To these need only be added the Wolf, Hyæna, and Bear, to exhaust the list of “beasts of prey” in the ordinary acceptation of the term, that is, of beasts which are dangerous to man, for we “lords of creation” are not sufficiently generous to include under the term beasts of equal cruelty which prey on the lower animals.
By most naturalists all these animals are grouped together under the single genus Felis, which is thus said to include a great number of species, as Felis leo (the Lion), Felis tigris (the Tiger), Felis catus (the wild Cat), &c. It is very usual to separate from the rest the Hunting Leopard, and make it constitute by itself a distinct genus, Cynælurus, or Gueparda, distinguished from its cousins by its great length of leg, and a slight difference in the form of its teeth. Some naturalists separate, in addition, the Lynxes, making of them the genus Lyncus, and others, again, prefer to make separate genera of all the chief kinds, calling the Lion Leo nobilis, the Tiger Tigris regalis, and so forth. This separation or union is, however, a mere conventional matter, and we prefer to consider all Felidæ as belonging to the one genus Felis, as the simplest and most comprehensible plan.
The Felidæ are found over almost the whole world, being absent only in Australia, New Zealand, the south-eastern part of the Malay Archipelago, the Polynesian Islands, Madagascar, and the Antilles. In all other parts of the world Cats—using the word in a wide sense—are found, and, wherever they are found they are feared, for such a compact assemblage of bloodthirsty tyrants and ruthless destroyers has no parallel in the whole animal kingdom.
Remains of fossil Felidæ have been found as far back as the Miocene or even the Eocene epoch, in the South of England, and Central and South Europe, in North-west India, in Nebraska, in North America, and in the caves of Brazil. Of these the best known is the great cave Lion or Tiger, the Felis spelæa.
Every part of these animals is so altered and specialised from the usual type of Mammalian structure as to assist in the best possible way the capturing, killing, and devouring of living prey. Looking merely at the outside, we are struck with the lithe, agile form, the small head, the total absence of anything like a “pot-belly,” the well-proportioned limbs, the usually close fur, the stealthy, silent movements, and the eager, restless glance: all characters suited to an animal to which powers of quiet rapid movement through jungle or long grass, of quick observation, and of great strength and agility, are of the utmost importance.
In the skeleton there are two points of importance, as relating both to the habits of the Cat tribe and to the determining of their systematic position in zoology. These are the character of the skull, and the structure and arrangement of the bones of the toes. Both these points furnish characters by which the Cats may be separated from all other families. To these two points, therefore, we will proceed at once, as, without going into lesser details, there is nothing of special importance in the vertebral column, large limb bones, &c. All the points mentioned in the introduction to the group as being characteristic of the Carnivorous type of skull are here carried to their extreme. The bony ridges for the attachment of the jaw-muscles are immense; the jaws attain their utmost limit of structure and strength, and the lower jaw being perfectly incapable of motion from side to side, the teeth, as we shall see by-and-by, act like scissors and not like mill-stones.
If the skull of a Cat be examined, there will be seen on its under surface, near the hinder end, a pair of rounded swellings, directed somewhat obliquely. On looking at the skull from the side, there is seen to be a roundish aperture, the auditory meatus, leading into each of these swellings, which are found to be thin-walled half globes, stuck on, as it were, to the under surface of the skull. Round the aperture is fixed, in the living state, the Cat’s prominent external ear, and stretched across it, like the parchment of a drum, is a thin membrane, which vibrates with every sound. The rounded cavity is called the “drum of the ear,” the membrane stretched across it the “drum membrane,” or “tympanic membrane,” and the bony half-globe, which forms the floor of the drum cavity, is the “bulb of the drum,” or bulla tympani.
