THE TAGUAN FLYING SQUIRREL. 153 
occupying about one foot eight inches, measured to the extremity of the long 
hairs with which it is so thickly clothed. The general colour of this animal 
is a clear chestnut, deepening into brown on the back, and becoming more 
ruddy on the sides. The little pointed ears are covered with short and soft 
fur of a delicate brown, and the tail is heavily clad with bushy hairs, greyish 
black on the basal portions of that member, and sooty black towards the 
extremity. The parachute membrane is delicately thin, scarcely thicker than 
ordinary writing-paper, when it is stretched to its utmost, and is covered with 
hair on both its surfaces, the fur of the upper side being chestnut, and that 
TAGUAN FLYING SQUIRREL.—(Pééromys Petaurista.) 
of the lower surface nearly white. A stripe of greyish black hairs marks the 
edge of the membrane, and the entire abdomen of the animal, together with 
the throat and the breast, is covered with beautiful silver greyish white fur. 
The true Squirrels possess no parachute flying membrane, as do the Flying 
Squirrels, nor are they furnished with cheek-pouches, as is the case with the 
Ground Squirrels in America. 
ONE of the most handsome of the Squirrels is the JELERANG, or JAVAN 
SQUIRREL, a native of Java, part of India, and Cochin China. Its total 
length is about two feet, the tail and body being equal to each other in 
measurement. In colour it is one of the most variable of animals, so that it has 
been more than once described under different names. In the British 
Museum are several specimens of this animal, and all of them present many 
varieties in point of colour, while some are so very unlike each other that 
most persons would consider them to be separate species. Some specimens of 
thigYanimal are pale yellow, while others are deep brown ; in some the colour is 
tolerably uniform, while in others it is variously pied, but in all there seems to 
pl 
be a tolerably decided contrast between a darker and lighter tint. From 
