328 FKTAURUS AUSTRALIS. 
more than a loot in length, without including the tail, which 
is cylindrical, bushy; and considerably longer than the head 
and body taken together. The ears are of nil elongate ovate 
form, and but sparingly clothed with hairs; indeed, nearly 
naked, excepting on the outer side at the base, where they 
are covered with fur like that on the head. The fur of the 
animal is long and soft, and subject to some variation in 
colouring; the ground colour on the upper parts of the body, 
however, is most frequently greyish, but much suffused with 
brownish yellow; the sides of the muzzle are dusky, 1 and the 
eyes are encircled with the same dark hue; the ears are 
black, and so is the fur of their base externally, but at the 
posterior angle it is yellowish: a broad blackish mark runs 
along the back to the root of the tail, and the flank mem¬ 
branes are dusky above and beneath, but edged with a 
yellowish fringe of hairs. The limbs and feet are hluck 
externally, and the former are all black on the inner side in 
the region of tlie wrist and ankle. The chin is dusky, and 
the throat, abdomen, and inner side of the limbs at the base 
are yellow. The tail is dusky, but suffused with brownish 
yellow, excepting on the apical third, which is black. The 
sides of the neck are greyish, and there is usually a pale spot 
on the cheek behind the eye. Sometimes the upper surface 
of the head and body are chiefly of a brownish black hue, 
and the yellowish grey assumes the form of two longitudinal 
hands, separating, on either side, the broad dark hand of the 
hack from the dark colouring of the upper surface of the 
flank membrane. In other specimens the prevailing hue on 
the upper parts is fulvous brown, the dorsal black hand 
being narrow, and the bright colour extending somewhat on 
to the flank membrane : the abdomen of a rich yellow hue. 
1 As I frequently use this term, I may as well explain that by it 1 mam 
a tlark hue apfiroachiny to black. 
