The Aye-Aye. 23 



the second sub-order of the Primates are 

 divided. 



Professor Owen's Aye- Aye was obtained for him 

 by Dr. Sandwith, who, while the animal was in his 

 possession, observed its habits very closely, and 

 wrote an extremely interesting account of them, 

 from which the following is an extract: "I 

 thought that those strong rodent teeth, as large as 

 those of a young beaver, must have been intended 

 for some other purpose than that of trying to eat 

 his way out of a cage, the only use he seemed to 

 make of them besides masticating soft fruits. 

 Moreover, he had other peculiarities, e.g. singularly 

 large naked ears directed forwards as if for 

 offensive rather than defensive purposes; then, 

 again, the second finger of the hands is unlike 

 anything but a monster supernumerary member, 

 it being slender and long, half the thickness of the 

 other fingers, and resembling a piece of bent wire. 

 Excepting the head and this finger, he closely 

 resembles a lemur. Now as he attacked every 

 night the woodwork of his cage, which I was 

 gradually lining with tin, I bethought myself of 

 tying some sticks over the woodwork, so that he 

 might gnaw these instead . . . they were bored 

 in all directions by a large and destructive grub 

 . . . presently he came to one of the worm-eaten 

 branches, which he began to examine most atten- 

 tively, and bending forward his ears and applying 

 his nose more closely to the bark, he rapidly tapped 

 the surface with the curious second digit as a wood- 



