t's skull, though
not so short, nor yet so long as that of the civet or dog. The
zygomatic arches are greatly developed, also the bony ridges for the
attachment of the muscles, especially the sagittal or great
longitudinal crest on the top of the head, which is in comparison
far larger than that of even the tiger, and to which are attached
the enormous muscles of the cheek working the powerful jaws, which
are capable of crushing the thigh-bone of a bullock. Captain Baldwin,
in his book, says he remembers once, when watching over a kill, seeing
a hyaena, only some twelve feet below where he sat, snap with a single
effort through the rib of a buffalo.

[Illustration: Skull of Hyaena.]

The hyaena also possesses the sub-caudal pouch of the civets, which
gave rise amongst the ancients to various conjectures as to the dual
character of its sex.

The _bulla tympani_ or bulb of the ear is large as in the cats, but
it is not divided into two compartments by a bony partition (which
in the dogs is reduced to a low wall), but the paroccipital process
or bony clamp on the external posterior surface is closely applied
to the bulb as in the cats, and not separated by a groove as in the
dogs.

The cervical vertebrae sometimes become anchylosed, from whence, in
former times, arose the superstition that this animal had but one
bone in the neck.

In its internal anatomy, digestive as well as generative, the hyaena
is nearer to the cat than the dog, but it possesses the _caecum_,
or blind gut, which is so large in the canidae, small in the felines,
and totally absent in the bears.

The tongue is rough, with a circular collection of retroflected
spines. The hind legs are much shorter than the front, and the feet
have only four toes with blunt worn claws, not retractile, but like
those of the dog.

The hair is coarse and bristly, and usually prolonged into a sort
of crest or mane along the neck and shoulders, and to a slighter
degree down the back; the tail is bushy.

Dental formula: Inc., 3--3/3--3; can., 1--1/1--1; premolars,
4--4/3--3; molars, 1--1/1--1.

There are only three known species of hyaena, of which one, our common
Indian animal, belongs to Asia, and two, _H. crocuta_ and _H.
brunnea_, to Africa.

_GENUS HYAENA_

NO. 220. HYAENA STRIATA.
_The Striped Hyaena_ (_Jerdon's No. 118_).

NATIVE NAMES.--_Taras_, _Hundar_, _Jhirak_ (in Hurriana);
_Lakhar-baghar_, _Lokra-bagh_, Hindi; _Naukra-bagh_, Bengali;
_Rerh