Lemuria

“ The ancients supposed that the souls after death wandered all over the world, and disturbed the peace of its inhabitants. The good spirits were called Lares familiares, and the evil ones were known by the name of Larvæ, or Lemures. They terrified the good, and continually haunted the wicked and impious; and the Romans had the superstition to celebrate festivals in their honour, called Lemuria, or ♦Lemuralia, in the month of May. They were first instituted by Romulus to appease the manes of his brother Remus, from whom they were called Remuria, and, by corruption, Lemuria. ”

“ Indeed, Lemurian man, during at least the first half of the race, must be regarded rather as an animal destined to reach [20] humanity than as human according to our understanding of the term; for though the second and third groups of Pitris, who constituted the inhabitants of Lemuria during its first four sub-races, had achieved sufficient self-consciousness in the Lunar Manvantara to differentiate them from the animal kingdom, they had not yet received the Divine Spark which should endow them with mind and individuality—in other words, make them truly human. ”

“ The evolution of this Lemurian race, therefore, constitutes one of the most obscure, as well as one of the most interesting, chapters of man's development, for during this period not only did he reach true humanity, but his body underwent the greatest physical changes, while the processes of reproduction were twice altered. ”

“ It may be as well again to repeat that the almost mindless creatures who inhabited such bodies as have been above described during the early sub-races of the Lemurian period can scarcely be regarded as completely human. It was only after the separation of the sexes, when their bodies had become densely physical, that they became human even in appearance. ”

“ Judging from the hints of the two other scholars, we may perhaps conclude that lemures and larvae are to be distinguished as hostile ghosts from manes, the good people (as the word is generally explained) , i. e. those duly buried in the city of the dead, and whom their living descendants have no need to fear so long as they pay them their due rites at the proper seasons as members of the family. And this conclusion is confirmed by the curious etymology of Ovid [417] , reproduced by Porphyrio, deriving Lemuria from Remus. ”

“ In order to understand the peculiarities of the Madagascar fauna we have to consider the past history of the African and Asiatic continents, which it is shown are such as to account for all the main peculiarities of the fauna of these islands without having recourse to the hypothesis of a now-submerged Lemurian continent. Considerable evidence is further adduced to show that "Lemuria" is a myth, since not only is its existence unnecessary, but it can be proved that it would not explain the actual facts of distribution. ”

“ The supposed "Lemuria" must have existed, if at all, at so remote a period that the higher animals did not then inhabit either Africa or Southern Asia, and it must have {424}become partially or wholly submerged before they reached those countries; otherwise we should find in Madagascar many other animals besides Lemurs, Insectivora, and Viverridæ, especially such active arboreal creatures as monkeys and squirrels, such hardy grazers as deer or antelopes, or such wide-ranging carnivores as foxes or bears. ”

“ The ancient Romans used on May Day to go in procession to the grotto of Egeria. From the 28th of April to the 2nd of May was kept the festival in honour of Flora, goddess of flowers. By the Romans the month was regarded as unlucky for marriages, owing to the celebration on the 9th, 11th and 13th of the Lemuria, the festival of the unhappy dead. This superstition has survived to the present day.
In medieval and Tudor England, May Day was a great public holiday. All classes of the people, young and old alike, were up with the dawn, and went “a-Maying” in the woods. ”

“ Darwin's views, that gaily coloured plumes are developed in the male bird for the purpose of attractive display."
104."Geographical Distribution of Animals," i. 286-7.
105."Geographical Distribution," i. 76. The name Lemuria was proposed by Mr. Sclater for an imaginary submerged continent extending from Madagascar to Ceylon and Sumatra. Wallace points out that if we confine ourselves to facts Lemuria is reduced to Madagascar, which he makes a subdivision of the Ethiopian Region. ”

“ Just as the Fish had typified the Silurian epoch, just as the Tortoise had started on its way the great amphibian evolution, so did the Boar, that typical mammal, start the mammalian evolution, and we come to the Lemurian continent with its wonderful variety of forms of mammalian life. Not so very ignorant after all, you see, the ancient writings! For men are only re-discovering to-day what has been in the hands of the followers of the Ṛishis for thousands, tens of thousands of years. ”

“ Thus half of the insular species consists of lemurians, niukis, and others, which are distinguished hy their habits, resembling those of Hquirrels, their long tails, their enormous hands, their piercing cries and shrieks, like those of human beings ”

“ In their mode of progression they are more quadrupedal than most of the other Lemuroids; they jump, walk, or run on all fours. Their food consists of fruits, birds' eggs, birds and insects. Their infants are carried about close to, and concealed amid, the hair of their mother's breast; when older they cling to her back.
The True Lemurs are all inhabitants of Madagascar and of the adjacent Comoro Islands. They are unknown on the African continent.
THE TRUE LEMURS. GENUS LEMUR. ”

“ The long tendons of the muscles for flexing the digits (the flexor longus digitorum) differ generally in arrangement from those of the higher Primates.
The Lemuroids are of no commercial value to Man.
As regards their distribution, the Lemuroidea are now absolutely confined to the Old World, and predominate in the island of Madagascar, where, as M. Grandidier remarks in his magnificent work on that country, there is scarcely a little wood in any district in which they are not found. Indeed, of the nearly seventy species of Mammals inhabiting that island, thirty-five, or one-half, are Lemurs. ”

“ The typical lemurs have rounded heads, doglike muzzles, and a soft, thick, woolly fur of various colors that is usually extended to form a long, bushy tail; and the largest of them, the "babakoto" of eastern Africa, is as big as a cat, and makes the woods ring at night with doleful howls. They hide in holes in trees or in leafy nests during the day, and at night wander about in trees, or on the rocks of the mountains they frequent, in search of insects and sleeping birds and their eggs, etc. All the lemurs proper, and their relatives, the endrinas, belong to Madagascar. ”

“ The palms of its hands and feet are smooth and leather-like, enabling the animal to apply them firmly to the wet rocks. This Lemur feeds on bananas and wild figs. In the winter its chief sustenance consists of the prickly-pear, peeling off the spiny skin with its long upper canines. According to the same observer, this Lemur rarely drinks water; indeed, it is said that the species living in the west of Madagascar, including two kinds of White Lemur, subsist without water, while those on the east coast invariably drink water with their meals. ”

“ Lemur catta seems to be the only member of the genus that is not arboreal. It lives among rocks where but few trees, and those much stunted, occur. Many species of Lemur are always to be seen in the Zoological Society's Gardens. Fourteen "species" have at one time or another been exhibited.
Sub-Fam. 3. Galagininae.—This sub-family is found on the continent of Africa as well as in Madagascar; but the genera are {543}different in the two districts. In Madagascar we have Opolemur, Microcebus, and Chirogale; on the continent, Galago. ”

“ Habits.—The special habits of this species of Lemur are unknown, but in all probability they agree with those of the group in general, as given under the heading of the genus. It is said to utter a coarse grunting call-note.
The young males are born black like the father, and the young females have the colour of the mother. Dr. Sclater has observed that in specimens in confinement in the Zoological Gardens, in London, the female carried her young one transversely across her belly, its long tail passing round her back and then round its own neck. ”

“ The first of these is the ring-tailed lemur, which may be recognized at once by the fact that its tail is marked just like that of the marmoset. The head and body are shaped like those of a very small fox, and the color of the fur is ashy gray, rather darker on the back, and rather lighter underneath. It lives in troops in Central Madagascar, and every morning and every night each troop joins in a little concert, just like the gibbons and the howlers. ”

“ This Lemuroid is probably the best known to travellers in Madagascar, at least by ear, as no one can travel along the most frequented route in the island, that from Tamatave to Antananarivo, without often hearing the cries of these animals as he passes through the great forest. They are not often seen, but their long drawn-out melancholy cries are frequently heard, a strange wailing sound, as if of people in distress, or children crying. ”

“ It is especially interesting to find these peculiar lemuroid forms in America, just when a lemur has been discovered of about the same age in Europe; and as the American forms are said to show an affinity with the South American marmosets, while the European animal is most allied to a West African group, we have evidently not yet got back far enough to find the primeval or ancestral type from which all the Primates sprang. ”

“ This genus has been constituted for two species of a specialised type of Lemur, characterised by a globose head, a short muzzle, with a tapering nose and short hairy ears. The hind-limbs are longer than the fore-limbs, the feet short and broad, and the tail hairy and equal in length to the body. ”

“ The lemur lives in trees and carries on a stealthy nocturnal business, moving on all fours in quest of his daily bread, and no external force or new habit avails to modify the hair-slope on his forearms, and so it remains until some primitive form of monkey, gradually evolving into a primitive ape, brings into the family new habits and customs. Other men and other manners appear in the Miocene Age. Our supposed Dryopithecus fontani becomes more upright in his bodily, and perhaps his moral habits, and spends an increasing amount of his leisure time in the sitting posture ”

“ At the point of each digit is a broad elastic pad, plentifully supplied with delicate nerves, and the vital energy which has been directed into them appears to have been withdrawn from the growth of the claws, which have shrunk into fine nails just shielding the fleshy tips. In short, the lemur has a hand on each of its four limbs, and no feet at all. And as it goes about its cage—I am at the Zoo in spirit—with a silent wonder shining out of its great eyes, it examines things by feeling them with its hands. ”

“ The maximum number of teeth is 36, there being typically two pairs of incisors and three of premolars in each jaw. In habits some of the species are nocturnal and others diurnal; but all subsist on a mixed diet, which includes birds, reptiles, eggs, insects and fruits. Most are arboreal, but the ring-tailed lemur (L. catta) often dwells among rocks. The species of the genus Lemur are diurnal, and may be recognized by the length of the muzzle, and the large tufted ears. ”

“ The black-headed lemur is the lowest Primate examined and it is characterised by highly developed patterns of ridges on the palm and sole, and these are interspersed with nodules on the regions less exposed to pressure. The complexity of the patterns of another, the ring-tailed lemur, is greater still. ”

“ The animals known as Lemurs, from their nocturnal and ghostly habits, are on a lower level of organisation than the other division of the Primates. Even the external form enables the members of the present sub-order to be readily distinguished from the higher Anthropoidea. The head is more like that of a Fox, with a sharp muzzle; it lacks the human expression of the face of even the lower among the Apes. ”

“ It is curious that the name Lemur or ghost is peculiarly applicable to the Indri or Babakote in another sense from that which led to its adoption by Linnaeus. The natives, in fact, believe that men after death become Indris. Naturally, therefore, these Lemurs have reaped the advantage of this superstition in almost perfect immunity from destruction. ”

“ The lemurs, or half-apes, are a large group of small tree-dwelling animals that paleontology shows were in early Tertiary times much more closely connected with monkeys than they are now; and it also shows that in a former age their ancestors were scattered all over the temperate parts of the globe; this assists us to account for the strange distribution of the remnants that now live—a part of them in the Malayan archipelago and a part in central Africa and Madagascar, in which island, indeed, lemurs abound more than elsewhere, owing largely, no doubt, to the scarcity of enemies. ”

“ This is not the universal way of carrying the young among lemurs. The Crowned Lemur, a beautiful grey-and-white species, often breeds at the Zoo. The female carries its young one partly on its side. The infant clings tightly with arms and tail round the very slender waist of the lemur, and pushes out its sharp little face just above the thigh of the mother. The Woolly Indri has more woolly fur than the others of its tribe, a shorter nose, and a longer tail. ”