Lemur

“ But the lemur's eyes are open to their widest and the ghostly little creatures are all moving about—beautiful animals all of them but with eerie, uncanny looks and ways—so stealthily that you might think they were doing wrong, and knew it ”

“ 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. ”

“ It does not proceed as imagination suggested, from the spirits of the dead at variance and afflicting one another, but from a warm-bodied, innocent creature, the lemur, which lives in the heights of the trees, feeds upon insects, birds and reptiles, and seldom comes to the ground. In appearance it is somewhat like a bulky bear’s cub, but not well armed for offense or defense, and leading a precarious life among the stronger and fiercer creatures of the forest. ”

“ 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plentifully supplied with delicate nerves, and the vital energy which has been directed into them appears to have been withdrawn from the growth of the claws, which have shrunk into fine nails just shielding the fleshy tips.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. ”

“ 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 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. ”

“ The sportive lemurs (Lepidolemur) are smaller than the typical species of Lemur, and the adults generally lose their upper incisors. The head is short and conical, the ears large, round and mostly bare, and the tail shorter than the body. Like the gentle lemurs they are nocturnal. ”

“ 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 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. ”

“ 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 long tail is at the base almost as wide as the body, tapering to a point, and covered with deep fur. But the greatest beauty of form which this lemur owns is the shape of its hands and feet. These exquisite little members are so far an exact reproduction of the human hand, that not only the hands, but also the feet, own a fully-developed thumb. But each finger, as well as the thumb, expands into a tiny disc, as in certain tree-frogs, so that the little hands may cling to the tree with the tightness of an air-pump. ”

“ The males of many kinds differ from the females in colour, and from the young also; moreover, at certain times of the year, according to the age of the animal, the fur changes its tints, and a corresponding alteration is produced by different food, so that the great number of species of Lemur described by naturalists must be regarded with suspicion. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I had not seen the great beast, so dense was the undergrowth in the forest. Where it is less dense another fact has its importance: the colour-resemblance between the mammals and their surroundings. The grayish lemur, which sits or sleeps huddled up high up on a branch spun over with lichens, resembles a knob or protuberance so clearly and convincingly that its form is only made out when the sportsman, taught by former experience, uses his glass and observes it keenly ”

“ A little lemur was once seen to leap about from branch to branch with the agility of a frog; it chirruped like a bird, and is not larger than a robin red-breast. Reptiles, though numerous, seldom troubled us ”

“ Female.—Formerly described as a distinct species, and known as the White-whiskered Lemur (L. leucomystax) . Face and lips black, darkest on the nose, round the eyes and hinder part of the head; forehead blackish-grey; whiskers and ear-tufts white, almost concealing the ears. General colour of body rich ferruginous brown, darker on the middle of the back; arms, legs and neck reddish-yellow; tail whiter; throat, under side of body and inner side of limbs creamy-white.
There is a considerable amount of variation in this species. Some individuals have the lower back and base of tail white ”

“ The young are dark Mouse-grey.
Distribution.—Milius' Mouse-Lemur, though a rare species, is widely distributed in Madagascar, being found in the Ankay Forest on the north-east coast as well as along the west coast as far south as Mouroundava.
Habits.—This beautiful little Lemur, no bigger than a Guinea-pig, is, like most of the other species of its group, nocturnal and arboreal, feeding on fruits and probably honey. It runs on all fours, but sits up to eat, holding its food in its hands. In the winter months it is believed to hibernate in hollow trees. ”

“ Of these the flying lemur is the most remarkable species. Specimens of this species are grouped in the lower part of the cases; they are from the Indian Archipelago; and in the texture of their skin and the loose and light way in which it connects their limbs, they resemble bats. They nurse their young by forming a kind of couch with their body suspended downwards from the branches of a tree.
It now remains for the visitor to direct his attention to the fine collection of
RAPACIOUS ANIMALS, ranged in thirty-two distinct wall-cases in this room. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Unlike the lively squirrels and monkeys, they do not leave their hiding-places till the tropical darkness has fallen on the forest, when they seek their food, not by descending to the ground, but by ascending to the upper surface of the ocean of trees, and again, at the first approach of dawn, seek refuge from the light in the recesses of some dark and hollow trunk. The Ring-tailed Lemur is as lively by day as night; but most of the race are so entirely creatures of darkness that the light seems to stupefy them. ”

“ The change which night makes in their general demeanour is simply miraculous. By day many of them are like hibernating animals, almost incapable of movement. When once the curtain of night has fallen, they are as active as squirrels, and as full of play as a family of kittens. The Ring-tailed Lemur is often kept as a pet, both in Madagascar and in the Mauritius. ”

“ When in a hurry it jumps along, standing on its hind feet, like a little kangaroo, but holding its tail upright behind its back. It will follow people upstairs in this way, jumping from step to step, with its front paws outstretched, as if it were addressing an audience. The French call these day lemurs Makis. The ring-tailed lemur lives largely among rocks and precipices. Most of these creatures live upon fruit, the shoots and leaves of trees, and other vegetable food. But, like the squirrel, they have no objection to eggs and nestlings, and also kill and eat any small birds and insects. ”

“ The mammæ, or teats, are two in number, and are placed near the armpits. Usually the species of Lemur have but one, or at most two, little ones at a birth, and the period of gestation is about one hundred and ten days, the young Lemur being born almost naked, and nearly without fur. Their hairs are short and sparsely distributed, except on the head, where they form a kind of belt around the eyes. ”

“ The winged lemur (Galeopithecus volans) , the flying-fox, and the flying-squirrel, are all moonshiners, and dread sunlight as miracle-mongers dread the light of science; but they all have the exaggerated optics of an owl, evening-eyes, that catch every ray of the fading twilight, while the eyes of the bat proper are as rudimentary as those of a mole, or of the strange fishes that were discharged from the subterranean tarns of Mount Cotopaxi. ”

“ Sub-family Nycticebinæ, contains four genera, viz.:—Nycticebus (3 sp.) —small, short-tailed, nocturnal animals, called slow-lemurs,—range from East Bengal to South China, and to Borneo and Java; Loris (1 sp.) —a very small, tail-less, nocturnal lemur, which inhabits Madras, Malabar, and Ceylon ”

“ 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. ”

“ They have usually a single young one at a birth, which is at first nearly naked, and is carried about, hanging close to and almost concealed by the hair of the mother's belly. After a while the young lemur changes its position and mounts upon the mother's back, where it is carried about until able to climb and leap by itself. ”

“ 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. ”

“ It is strange to be in a house in which there are no pets, for a small Malay bear which lives at the back can scarcely be called one. Sometimes in the evening a wild animal called a lemur rushes wildly through the house and out at the front veranda. I am always afraid of being startled by his tearing through my room in the depths of the night, for here, as in many other houses, instead of doors there are screens raised a foot from the ground. ”

“ This animal belongs to the order Primates, which includes man, the apes, and the lemurs. The lemurs are the lower kinds of the order, and differ much from the apes. They have their head-quarters in the Island of Madagascar. The aye-aye is a lemur, but it differs singularly from all its congeners, and still more from all apes. In its dentition it strongly approximates to the rodent (rat, squirrel, and guinea-pig) order, as it has two cutting teeth above, and two below, growing from permanent pulps, and in the adult condition has no canines. ”

“ But this is due to their special adaptation to seeing in the dark tropical night. By day the pupil of the eye almost disappears. If only we could also see in the dark, the eyes of the lemur might have as much expression as those of a faithful dog. ”

“ That angel Gazelle has certainly contrived to grow up into that species of deer generally denominated ‘hog;’ he is therefore not eminently graceful, but his manners and disposition are quite beyond praise. The lemur is very tame and frightens me with its black human hands. ”

“ 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. ”