I38 ON THE LORIS, 



tory, and his engraved representation of it has little 

 resemblance to nature ; so little that, when I was en- 

 deavouring to find in his work a description of the 

 quadrumane which had just been sent me from Dacca, 

 I passed over the chapter on the Loris, and ascertained 

 it merely by seeing in a note the Linntean character of 

 the slow-paced Lemur. The illustrious French natura- 

 list, whom, even when we criticise a few parts of his 

 noble work, we cannot but name with admiration, 

 observes of the Loris, that > from the proportion of lis 

 body and limbs, one would not suppose it slow in walking 

 cr leaping, and intimates an opinion, that Seba gave 

 this animal the epithet of slow -moving, from some fan- 

 cied likeness to the Sloth of America : but, though its 

 body be remarkably long in proportion to the breadth 

 of it, and the hinder legs, or more properly arms, 

 much longer than those before, yet the Loris, in fact, 

 walks or climbs very slowly, and is, probably, un- 

 able to leap. Neither its genus nor species, we find, 

 are new : yet, as its temper and instincts are unde- 

 scribed, and as the Natural History by M. De Bur- 

 fon, or the System of Nature by Linnj*:cs, cannot 

 always be readily procured, I have set down a few 

 remarks on the/0/7?/, the manners, the name, and the 

 country of my little favourite, who engaged my af- 

 fection while he lived, and whose memory I wish to 

 perpetuate. 



I. This male animal had four hands, each five- 

 fingered ; palms naked; nails round, except tlv 

 of the indices behind, which were long, curv- 

 ed, 



! 



