10 
WARD'S NATURAL SCIENCE BULLETIN. 
THE C0LU60 AND HIS COUSIN. 
Glancing at the long series of living things, we 
frequently encounter species, which, besides hav- 
ing all the characteristics of their own order, pos- 
sess other peculiarities observed only in widely 
different divisions of the animal kingdom. Thus 
the sea-horse (. Hippocampus ) combines some of 
the attributes of a monkey, a fish, a marsupial 
and a horse. It has the prehensile tail so com- 
mon among the lesser Quadrumana, the internal, 
and, to a limited extent, the external structure of 
a fish. Its young are developed in a pouch as 
with the marsupials and its head has a decided- 
ly equine appearance. 
Less peculiar, hut no less interesting creatures, 
are the Galeopitheci. Of these hut two species 
have as yet been discovered: Galeopithecus vo- 
lans and G. Philippine, nsis. The former species, 
called in common parlance “ Colugo,” was for 
many years the only known representative of the 
genus. Bontius, who had observed individuals 
in their natural state, first described them under 
the name Vespertiliones mirabiles, or Wonderful 
Bats. Attention was afterwards called to these 
strange creatures by Camellius and Petiver, the 
former naturalist inventing the name Galeopith- 
eci , which signifies cat- monkeys. 
Most of our readers are, without doubt, famil- 
iar with our native flying squirrel ( Sciuropterus 
volucella). At a hurried glance the Colugo close- 
ly resembles this pretty rodent of our wood-lands. 
On more careful examination, however, we ob- 
serve that the aliform or flying-membrane is far 
more developed in Galeopithecus than in Sciurop- 
terus. In the flying squirrel it merely unites the 
limbs on either side of the body ; in the Colugo 
it includes also the tail, embraces the separate 
digits of the hands and feet and extends from 
the thumb to the chin. Galeopithecus volans is 
almost as large as a cat, about sixt_y centimetres 
in length, including the tail, which is about half 
the length of the body. The animal is covered 
with soft, wooly hair, which undergoes great va- 
riation in color in different individuals. The 
young Colugo is dull brown, grey or fulvous, 
mai'ked with white spots and lines; adult speci- 
mens are clad in a more uniform livery of brown- 
ish tints above, replaced by impure white. on the 
lower surface of the body. A very striking va- 
riety is described as being black above,. adorned 
with spots of pale yellow. Such variation in 
color easily accounts for the somewhat careless 
accumulation of synonymous specific names in 
so limited a genus as Galeopithecus. 
The head of the Colugo reminds one of the 
large fruit-eating hats, the muzzle is somewhat 
more inflated, the nostrils large and far apart, 
crescent shaped, the feelers very short, eyes mod- 
erate, the ears rounded, about 2 cm. in length. 
The four limbs are of nearly the same length, 
the hands and feet slender, each with five digits, 
which are long, laterally compressed, terminating 
in large, powerful, laterally flattened claws. The 
palms and soles, as also the terminal joints of the 
digits, on their inner faces are bare. The thumb 
with its claw reaches the end of the first joint of 
the first finger, the first finger is shorter by a claw 
than the second, the second, third and fourth fin- 
gers almost equal, the third slightly longer than 
the second and fourth. The first toe is half the 
length of the second, second and fifth, third and 
fourth equal, the latter pair somewhat longer 
than the former. The sides of the body beneath 
are naked, the skin currugated. The female Co- 
lugo has a pair of mammae on either breast. 
Not alone in its exterior, which we have so far 
attempted to describe, is the Colugo a little living 
curiosity shop. The inside of his small body 
presents many a striking peculiarity. Let us 
look at his teeth. Of these he has thirty-four. 
(Gray says he has only thirty-one!) Looking at 
the upper jaw first, we see that he has two incis- 
ors situated where we should expect to find ca- 
nines. These are wanting. The first of these 
incisors is small, the second has two roots, is flat- 
tened and triangular. These two incisor-s are fol- 
lowed by two sharp premolars, resembling the 
second incisor. We next meet with four acute 
molars, quadrangular, broader than long, closely 
resembling one another in form and size. Look 
next at his under jaw. He has four incisors of 
quite a different form from those in the upper 
jaw. They are set into the mandible at an angle 
of about forty-five degrees. Their general out- 
line is that of the same teeth in some Quadruma- 
na. They are remarkable for being each split 
into nine or ten little tynes, giving them the ap- 
pearance of combs. Hence they are called in 
scientific language pectinate incisors. The pre 
molars and molars differ but slightly from those 
in the upper jaw. They are more acutely notch- 
ed. The skull which carries these singular 
teeth resembles that of a Lemur. It is 
broad and flat, the orbits protruding. The 
lower jaw is attenuated anteriorly, the angles are 
broad, rounded, bent outwards. The symphysis, 
or line of juncture of the two parts of the lower 
jaw, is much swollen beneath. The neck verte- 
brae are broad, the axis with prolonged spinous 
process, the remaining vertebral processes short 
and weak. The three first pairs of ribs are 
narrow, the next very broad, sternum broad, 
clavicles very long, humerus straight, thin, car- 
pus of seven bones, second phalanx of fingers 
the longest, ilia small, subcylindrical, femur long 
and straight, patella broad, oval and flat, tibia 
as long as the femur, fibula entire, filiform; toes 
shorter and weaker than the fingers. Peculiari- 
ties of the visceral organs of the Colugo are the 
obliquely prolonged stomach, the compression of 
the pyloric region, the intestine six or seven 
times the length of the body, the two lobed emar- 
ginate liver, the small gall bladder and spleen, 
and finally the lungs devoid of lobes. 
Now that we have examined the structure, ex- 
ternal and internal, of the Vespertilio mirabilis , 
we must attempt to answer a question which has 
certainly occurred to most of our readers before 
reaching this part of our description. Where 
does the Colugo live and what are its habits? 
Travelers tell us that our friend inhabits the for- 
ests of Malacca, Sumatra and Borneo. Some 
authors state that it occurs also in Java. This 
assertion is refuted by Wallace, whose extended 
travels among the islands in that distant part of 
the Indian Ocean, make him an able judge on 
such points. The animal is nocturnal in its hab- 
its, remaining during the day suspended from a 
horizontal limb by its hands and feet with its 
head on its breast. The dull color of its fur ren- 
ders it inconspicuous among the similarly colored 
trunks and branches. In the sudden tropical twi- 
light, however, it awakes, sallies forth and may 
be seen skipping with blithe, squirrel-like move- 
ments along the branches of its leafy home. 
From time to time it lets itself fall from some 
high projecting limb. The expanded membrane 
acts as a parachute and the creature sweeps slow- 
ly and obliquely to the earth. In one such aereal 
bound the Colugo has been known to clear a 
space of seventy meter’s. It never actually flies 
any more than does our flying squirrel. Its food 
is given by some older naturalists as insects, 
small birds and occasionally fruits; others, and 
among these Wallace, assert that it subsists on 
leaves. Jungliuhn tells us that the cry of the 
Galeopithecus is like that of a child in agony, 
that ‘ 1 it rang forth direfully from time to time 
on the still night.” But a single young is pro- 
duced at a birth. This, blind and naked, clings 
to its mother’s breast in a most helpless condi- 
tion. The Colugo is hunted by the natives for its 
soft fur, which is hardly less fine and dense than 
that of the Chinchilla, and for its flesh, which 
owing to its strong ordor, is disgusting to the 
taste of civilized man. 
It now remains for us to determine the posi- 
tion of Galeopithecus in the mammal series. It 
is supposed that this singular animal, allied to 
some low form of mammalian life, has survived 
with but slight change, the vicissitudes which 
produced the present Insectivora , Lemuroidea and 
Marsupialia from that same ancestral form. Its 
position is, of course, another disputed point 
among scientists. It has been classed at differ- 
ent times and by different naturalists with the 
Lemurs , the Cheiroptera , the Insectivora and 
even with the Carnivora ! Let us glance rapidly 
at the respective grounds of the different natu- 
ralists. The teeth, the prominent orbit of the 
skull, and its arboreal habits have placed the 
Colugo with the Lemuroidea\ its aliform mem- 
brane, though totally different in structure from 
that of the bats, has probably united it with the 
Cheiroptera. One French naturalist has called 
it a carnassier ( Carnivore ), for what reason? Be- 
cause it was believed to feed on birds. The an- 
imal’s relation to the Marsupials is suggested by 
the fact that its single young is very small, nak- 
ed and blind at birth and remains for a longtime 
attached to the corrugated skin of its mother’s 
breast. The most modern and perhaps the best 
writers on the Galeopithecus, agree in placing 
the genus at the head of the order Insectivora. 
Its cranium with its considerably vaulted cerebral 
cavity, and its large orbits resembles the skulls 
of the higher genera of insect eating mammals, 
as Tupaia, Macroscelides and Rhynchocyon. The 
radius and ulna, as in others of this family, are 
fused together. The scaphoid and lunar carpal 
bones coalesce, the fibula is complete and dis 
tinct. 
Thus far we have confined our attention to on- 
ly one of the two species of Galeopithecus. They 
are so similar that in describing one, the oth- 
er is portrayed. Galeopithecus philippinensis is, 
as its name indicates, an inhabitant of the Phil- 
