342 TYPES OF ANIMAL LIFE 



grey colour. It is not only an extremely active and 

 graceful animal, but also a very gentle one, making an 

 excellent pet (Fig. 84). 



All the lemurs are inhabitants exclusively of the 

 Island of Madagascar, where they live in small troops 

 in the woods, which they make resound with their cries; 

 they are excellent climbers, but, when on the ground, 

 remain on all fours. In sleeping they wrap their long 

 tails round their bodies. Their food consists of fruits, 

 eggs, young birds, and insects, and they seek it by day, 

 though they are most active towards evening. They 

 have one or two young at a birth, which at first are 

 nearly naked, and are carried about by the mother, cling- 

 ing to her belly and almost concealed by the long hair 

 which clothes it. Lemurs have teeth much like those 

 of monkeys, and like them and ourselves have but four 

 cutting teeth in the middle of each jaw, though it looks 

 at first sight as if there were six in the lower one, since 

 the lower eye-teeth are formed like the cutting-teeth 

 which are adjacent to them. 



Madagascar also possesses a curious group of leruu- 

 roids called indris — short-tailed, long-tailed, and woolly 

 — which have only two cutting-teeth in the lower jaw. 



The short-tailed indris is the giant amongst lemuroids, 

 its head and body together measuring two feet. It lives 

 in the forests of the eastern part of Madagascar, going 

 about in small parties of four or five individuals. Its 

 hind legs are much longer than its fore limbs, and its 

 great toes are very large, and on the ground it assumes 

 an upright attitude (Fig. 85). 



Of long-tailed indris there are at least three different 

 kinds, and one or other of these species is to be found all 

 over Madagascar, living in small troops of six or eight. 

 They are also large animals which are veiy arboreal. 



