86 MAMMALS

though generally given a bad name, are by no means
untamable, and have even been used as watchdogs.
Like dogs, their claws are not retractile. They have
the strongest jaws of all the carnivores, their conical
premolars being so buttressed up with fore-and-aft
tubercles that, aided by the flesh-teeth and tusks, a
hyzena, as Mr. Lydekker says, ‘is able to crunch in
its jaws the shin-bone of an ox almost as readily as
a dog can break that of a fowl.’ There are quite a
number of species of hyzena, but three only are now
known as living. Of these, the striped one (7. striata)
is both Asiatic and African; but the brown one (ZH.
brunnea) and the spotted or laughing one (4. crocuta)
are exclusively African.

The striped hyzena seems to have ranged over all
the Old World, and is an animal of respectable
antiquity, for its teeth have been found fossil even in
England. In Syria and Palestine its favourite haunts
are the rock-cut tombs, but it does not confine its
attention to dead meat, for a donkey belonging to
one of Canon Tristram’s servants was killed by a
hyena, and it often carries off dogs and sheep and
goats. Like all hyzenas, it is very high and heavy on
the fore legs, and the prints made by the hind feet
are very light and small. Colonel Sykes brought
one of these hyenas home from India with him,
and placed it in the Zoological Gardens. It had
been as faithful and playful as many a dog. When
the colonel paid any of his occasional visits to the
Gardens, it always recognised him instantly among
the crowd. One day when he came, the hyzna was
asleep and he called it by name. The animal jumped