102 LLOYD’S NATURAL HISTORY. 
Habits.—Like the other Flying Phalangers, this species 
possesses the power of taking, with the aid of its parachute, 
long flying leaps from tree to tree. The leap is always in. 
downward direction, and may be described as a kind of floating 
through the air, which must not by any means be confoundec 
with the true flight of a Bat or a Bird, which can be sustained 
for an indefinite length of time, and is accompanied, and in- 
deed produced, by rapid movements of the fore limbs. These 
animals are generally found in hilly districts, where gum-trees 
do not grow, and pass their whole time in the trees, feeding 
on the leaves and fruit, and spending the day in some hollow 
branch or within the stem itself, whence they issue forth for 
their nocturnal flight. When disturbed, or in flight, they utter 
a loud piercing scream, audible for a long distance. 
THE STRIPED PHALANGERS. GENUS DACTYLOPSILA. 
Dactylopsila, Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc., 1858, p. 109. 
Size medium ; ears oval, nearly naked terminally ; no para- 
chute-like membrane. Fore toes very unequal, the fourth much 
the longest, the others in the order 3, 5, 2, 1; fourth and fifth 
hind toes much longer than the others; a prominent pad on 
the wrist; claws long; tail long, cylindrical, evenly bushy, 
with the extreme tip naked inferiorly. Body conspicuously 
striped with black and white. Molar teeth oblong, with four 
cusps. 
The two species of this genus, which ranges from Northern 
Australia to New Guinea and the Aru Islands, are readily dis- 
tinguished from all their allies by the great elongation of the 
fourth toe of the fore limb. It has been suggested that this 
toe is elongated for the purpose of extracting insects and their 
larve from holes in decayed wood and from beneath the 
bark of trees, and consequently that the creatures are mainly 
