FAMILY OF LEMURS. 
5 
rendering their forms indistinct among the the dark foliage of the trees, and thus 
serving as a friendly veil, rouses them from their repose, and invites them to 
sweep along through the woods in quest of food. They are, in fact, essentially 
nocturnal or crepuscular. They sleep perched on branches, with the head buried 
between the arms, in the fur of the chest; and with the tail wound round the 
body, thus appearing like balls of fur. 
Active and at home among the trees, they are far less so on the ground, to 
which they rarely resort. When there, they move along obliquely, in a sort of 
canter or succession of bounds, applying the whole of the hands and feet, as do 
plantigrade animals, to the level surface over which they traverse, but from which 
they are ever anxious to escape. 
Having thus sketched the general characters and habits of the family, we shall 
next proceed to a consideration of the several genera into which it is subdivided. 
Genus Lemur. —Gen. Char. :—Headlong and triangular, muzzle pointed ; eyes 
moderate and oblique; ears short and hairy; tail very long and bushy. The 
hinder limbs longer than the anterior, the tibia and the femur being of equal 
length.— 
Incisors 
molars on each side 
The incisors above 
, canines 
are small; below long, compressed, pointed, and in close array, projecting almost 
horizontally; the outermost on each side is the largest; they form altogether a sort 
of spoon or scooping instrument. The canines above are large, sharp, compressed, 
with a posterior cutting edge; those of the lower jaw are smaller, and fit into a 
space between the upper canine and first false molar. Of the molars on each 
side above, the two first are false; simple and acutely conical; the true molars 
have each three pointed tubercles on their crown. The last molar is small. 
False molars below, two; true molars three, the last being small. Mammae., 
two, pectoral. In the annexed sketch we give profiles of a hand and foot, and of 
the head, of one of this genus, in order to render the characters intelligible. 
The true Lemurs are 
all natives of Madagascar, 
where they supply the 
place of the Simice., so 
abundant on the adjacent 
shores of the African con¬ 
tinent. This circumstance, 
connected with others in 
reference to the indigen¬ 
ous mammalia of Mada¬ 
gascar, stamps the island 
with peculiar interest in 
l,hand^2Jootofthe Lemur. the Consideration of the 
