60 
SLING-TAILED LEMUR. 
gant, and his hair always neat and glossy ; he is 
remarkable for the largeness of his eyes ; for the 
height of its hind legs, which are much longer 
■ than those before ; and for his large and beautiful 
tail, which is always erect, always in motion, and 
garnished with thirty alternate rings of black and 
white,, well marked and separated from each other ; 
his manners are gentle ; and though he bears great 
resemblance to the monkies, he possesses none of 
their malicious dispositions. In a state of liberty, 
this species live in society, and are found in 
Madagascar, in troops of thirty or forty. In a 
domestic state, the prodigious rapidity of their 
movements, renders them incommodious : it is for 
this reason they are generally chained ; for, 
though extremely active and vivacious, they are 
neither mischievous nor ferocious ; they tame to 
such a degree, as to go out and return without 
running off. Their gait is oblique, like that of 
all animals that have hands instead of feet. They 
leap more gracefully than they, walk, are rather 
silent, uttering only a short acute cry when sur- 
prised or irritated ; they sleep in a sitting posture, 
with the head resting on the breast ; their body 
is longer but not thicker than that of a cat ; but 
the height of their legs gives them an appearance 
of being larger thaxl they really are : their hair, 
though soft to the touch, stands always erect. 
But, to give a more accurate description of the 
animal, it has the point of its nose black, with 
black circles round its eyes ; the rest of its face 
is white ; and its ears stand erect ; the hair on the 
top of its head, on the hind part, is of a deep ash 
colour ; the back and sides of a reddish ash 
colour ; the outsides of the limbs are paler ,* its 
belly and the inside of the limbs are white ; all 
its hair is very soft, close, and fine ; erect like 
the pile of velvet ; its tail* which is twice the 
