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Show WHY LIONS NEVER PURR. A lion, while an accredited member of the cat family, cannot purr, how-over how-over happy ho may be when you stroke him, because the hyold bone in his throat is loose. He has to roar. This Is one of a number of Interesting Interest-ing things discovered about the cat family recently by scientists at the London zoo. R. I. Pocock, superintendent superinten-dent of tho zoo, oxplains that theso felidao or cat family that have an elastic elas-tic ligament between tho ceratohyal and tho upper elements of tho suspen-sorium suspen-sorium (Hon, tiger, leopard, jaguar) roar,( but never purr, while all the other species of tho felidae, with normally nor-mally constructed hyolds, purr, but never roar, and among these are tho cheetah and puma. Tho roars of the jaguar and leopard leop-ard are llko "hoarse, barking coughs, an interval of about ono second separating sep-arating tho expiratory efforts, said tliis observer. They may be easily reproduced or imitated by sawing a piece of thin board with a coarse-toothed coarse-toothed saw. The cheetah, however, calls with a decided mow, very much like that of .the cat. San Francisco Chronicle. |