TBE CO LUGO, OR FLYING LEMUR. 
345 
HIND FOOT OF COLUGO. ( Four-fifths Natural Size.) 
tody, and can be stretched by the extension of the limbs to which it is attached so as to act as a sort 
of parachute, which supports its owner after the same fashion as the very similar fold of skin that 
exists in the same position in the so-called Flying Squirrels and Flying Opossums. In the CoJugo, 
however, this curious arrangement is carried further than 
in the other groups of Mammals just mentioned ; for, as in 
the Bats, there is a distinct antebrachial membrane, stretch- 
ing along the front of the arms from the wrists to the 
sides of the neck ; and the space between the hind limbs 
is occupied by an ample triangular membrane, down the 
middle of which the long tail passes, and which is also 
stretched by the extension of the limbs. Even the toes are 
joined by membranes as far as the base of the claws, and 
this great development of the skin must be regarded as to 
a certain extent approximating the creature to the Bats. 
The whole of this fold of skin is clothed both above and 
beneath with hair ; and although some observers have 
described the animal as moving its expanded membranes 
during flight, no approach to the peculiar action of the 
Bat’s wing can ever be made by it. The most striking point 
in which it exceeds the other parachute-bearing Mammals is 
the development of the membrane between the hind limbs, and this, by the action of the tail, may be 
made to exert a powerful influence upon the course of the animal during its so-called flights. Mr. 
Wallace, who had the opportunity of observing the Colugo in its native haunts, describes its flight as 
follows : — “ Once, in a bright twilight,” he says, “ 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 itself through the air, other- 
wise in so long a distance it would have little chance of alighting exactly 
upon the trunk.” In a subsequent work, following other writers, he refers 
this power to the agency of the tail, and even thinks that the animal may 
rise over obstacles in its course by the elevatory action of that organ. 
The tail is of considerable length, and according to some writers its ex- 
tremity has a slight prehensile action which is of assistance to the animal 
in climbing. The membranes, when not in use, as when the Colugo is 
walking or climbing, fall in great folds at the sides of the body. 
Passing now, by a natural transition, from the parachute-like mem- 
branes to the limbs which traverse and serve to extend them, we find that 
these exhibit certain peculiarities of structure which are amongst the 
anomalies of this singular creature. The bones of both fore and hind 
limbs are elongated and slender — a character which contrasts strongly 
bones of hind foot of with the general state of things in the Insectivora — and the ulna, which 
colugo (Four-fifties Natural Size.) is particularly slender, is united to the radius towards the extremity. 
The feet consist of five digits, and they are specially adapted to enable the 
animal to climb readily upon the bark of the trunks and branches of trees. In the hind feet 
especially part of the tarsal bones (the navicular and cuboides) are constructed so that they can easily 
turn upon the astragalus and calcancum, and thus the sole is turned inwards, an arrangement which 
facilitates the clasping action of the feet. The inner digits in all the feet possess considerable power of 
independent motion, although they are never convei'ted into opposable thumbs ; and this arrangement, 
combined with the presence of sharp strong claws upon all the toes, must greatly favour the peculiar 
mode of life of the animal. It is to be remarked that the structure of the hind feet presents some 
analogy to that prevailing in Bats, and that in repose the Colugo suspends itself from a, branch by 
