The Flying Lemur. 145 



of cultivation. About Lobo Raman tusks and bones are oc- 

 casionally found in the forest, but the living animal is now 

 never seen. The rhinoceros (Rhinoceros sumatranus) still 

 abounds, and I continually saw its tracks and its dung, and 

 once disturbed one feeding, which went crashing away through 

 the jungle, only permitting me a momentary glimpse of it 

 through the dense underwood. I obtained a tolerably perfect 

 cranium and a number of teeth, which were picked up by the 

 natives. 



Another curious animal, which I had met with in Singapore 

 and in Borneo, but which was more abundant here, is the Ga- 

 leopithecus, or flying lemur. This creature has a broad mem- 

 brane extending all round its body to the extremities of the 

 toes, and to the point of the rather long tail. This enables it 

 to pass obliquely through the air from one tree to another. 

 It is sluggish in its motions, at least by day, going up a tree 

 by short runs of a few feet, and then stopping a moment as if 

 the action was difficult. It rests during the day clinging to 

 the trunks of trees, where its olive or brown fur, mottled with 

 irregular whitish spots and blotches, resembles closely the col- 

 or of mottled bark, and no doubt helps to protect it. Once, 

 in a bright twilight, I saw one of these animals run up a trunk 

 in a rather open place, and then glide obliquely through the 

 air to another tree, on which it alighted near its base, and im- 

 mediately began to ascend. I paced the distance from the 

 one tree to the other, and found it to be seventy yards ; and 

 the amount of descent I estimated at not more than thirty-five 

 or forty feet, or less than one in five. This I think proves 

 that the animal must have some power of guiding itself through 

 the air, otherwise in so long a distance it would have little 

 chance of alighting exactly upon the trunk. Like the Cuscus 

 of the Moluccas, the Galeopithecus feeds chiefly on leaves, and 

 possesses a very voluminous stomach and long convoluted in- 

 testines. The brain is very small, and the animal possesses 

 such remarkable tenacity of life that it is exceedingly difficult 

 to kill it by ordinary means. The tail is prehensile, and is 

 probably made use of as an additional support while feeding. 

 It is said to have only a single young one at a time, and my 

 own observation confirms this statement, for I once shot a fe- 

 male, with a very small blind and naked little creature cling- 



K 



