THE COBEGOS OR KAGUANS 



313 



Habits 



tinct roots. This is a unique feature among living Mammals, although the moles 

 and hedgehogs have two roots to their upper tusks. 



The common cobego is found in Sumatra, Borneo, Java, the Malay 

 Peninsula, Tenasserim, and Siam, and is known as Galeopithecus volans. 

 It is about the size of a cat; and its habits have been well described by Mr. Wallace, 

 who met with it in Sumatra. He observes that the cobego "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 



THE COBEGO. 

 (One-sixth natural size.) 



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

 spots and blotches, resembles closely the color 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 immediately 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 



