Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?
“Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?”
A recent writer[16] is very anxious to depose the Lion from the post of honour usually assigned to him, that the “Royal Tiger” may reign in his stead. And, although Englishmen will never feel quite happy to see the “Emperor of India” put even on an equality with the “British Lion,” we can hardly help thinking that an unprejudiced person would consider the flowing mane and tufted tail of the Lion more than counterbalanced by the brilliant colour, more perfect form, and superior size of the Tiger.
The anatomical characters are so similar to those of the other Cats, that it is needless to dwell upon them; they are, indeed, for the most part so exactly like those of the Lion, that even the illustrious Cuvier is said to have been completely worsted in an attempt to separate the mingled bones of the two species. In the skull, however, the muzzle is shorter than in the Lion, and forms a bolder curve with the forehead, a character very well seen in the living animal, and making the Tiger’s face much rounder, and more like that of the Domestic Cat than the Lion’s. In the skeleton, as in that of other Cats, the flexibility of the spinal column is very noticeable, as also is the arrangement of the limb bones, especially those of the hind limb, which are so disposed as to form a sort of double C-spring. ([See the figure of the Lion’s skeleton on p. 5.]) When a Tiger leaps, he first crouches down, bending the backbone into a strong downward curve by means of the great muscles which lie beneath it, at the same time contracting the flexor muscles of the limbs, more particularly of the hind limbs, so as to make their three divisions—thigh, leg, and foot—set at an acute angle to one another. He then brings into play the immense extensor muscles, which are especially well developed in all leaping animals, the back and limbs are straightened, and the animal, weighty as it is, its projected forwards with immense force.
The pupil of the eye is round. The tail is long, and devoid of a terminal tuft, and there is no mane like the Lion’s, although the cheeks bear large whisker-like tufts of stiff hairs. Similar bristles occur on the chin, lips, and eyebrows, those on the cheek being especially large, and constituting the sensitive vibrissæ which are so noticeable in most Cats, as well as in many other animals. All these hirsute appendages are capable of being erected when the animal is angry. For this purpose the bulb-like ends of them, which are imbedded in the skin, are covered with slips of muscular fibre from the great cutaneous muscle—that by which quadrupeds are enabled to “shiver” their skins—and these hair muscles are provided with an abundant supply of nerves. When the muscles contract, they make the hairs “stand on end,” producing a sort of magnified “goose-skin.” The vibrissæ are especially sensitive, and are of great assistance to the Tiger as he makes his way through the jungle in the dark.
