PROSIMI^E. 763 



A. Madagascar Lemurs, with the tympanic annulus free in the 

 bulla. 



Family Lemurimx 1 , with long faces. Some have interesting tufts of 

 vibrissie on the forearm, and a strange forearm gland, with 

 spines in the male. 



Family Indrisinae, with short faces, cerebrum covering cere- 

 bellum. 



Family Chiromyimv, with one type Chiromys, the Aye-Aye, highly 

 specialised, e.g. with very long slender third finger, with a flat 

 nail on the thumb only, with rodent-like permanent incisors 



-), with inguinal mammoe. 



, / 7 O 



1003 



B. Ethiopian and Oriental Lemurs, with the tympanic sharing in 



making the bulla. 



Family Galagince, with one type Galago, with elongated calcaneum 

 and navicular. It occurs right across Africa. 



Family Lorisinre. All Asiatic. 



C. The aberrant Indo-Malayan Tars/ns, with many peculiarities, e.g. 



the orbit communicates with the temporal fossa only] by a 

 fissure, the upper incisors are close together, the calcaneum and 

 navicular are greatly elongated like the calcaneum and astragalus 

 in the frog, the placenta is metadiscoidal and deciduate as in 

 monkeys. 



The lemurs are interesting, both because they link the Anthropoidea 

 to lower Mammals, and because of their distribution. In Eocene 

 times or even earlier they appeared in Europe and N. America, and 

 were then of more generalised type. In the latter continent they 

 became extinct ; but in the Old World they appear to have migrated 

 southwards at an early period into Ethiopian and Oriental regions. 

 They reached Madagascar at a time when that island was connected to 

 the continent, and before the advent of the larger carnivores. There 

 they have been isolated and have developed in a fashion comparable 

 to that which has occurred in the case of the Australian Marsupials. 

 Of fifty living species thirty-six are confined to Madagascar, and the 

 lemurs are there exceedingly numerous in individuals. Outside of 

 Madagascar they maintain a precarious footing in forests or islands, 

 and are usually few in number. They are handicapped by the 

 absence of defensive weapons, the frequent slowness of movement, 

 and the feeble intelligence ; they are saved by their arboreal 

 and usually nocturnal habits, by their quiet movements, and by their 

 shyness. 



