THE 
SOUTHERN PETAURUS. 
b £ i* & •*> * 4* & -> ❖ *£ # ^ ❖ 4* ❖ 4- •£ %■ 4 -H* o* 
Generic Character. 
'"'•! or 
7lv/Z> differing in the different fpecies.-mr 
Body furrounded by a flying-fldn. 
Specific Character, &c. 
PETAURUS blackifii above, whitifh below, 
with the thumbs of the hind-feet rounded. 
HEPOONA ROO. 
Whites Voyage to Botany Bay. 
It may perhaps be doubted whether this animal 
might not conftitute a genus per fe, rather than be re¬ 
garded as a fpecies merely : but as the institution of 
genera from two or three particular circumftances on¬ 
ly ; e. g. a peculiarity in the teeth, claws, &c. fre¬ 
quently throws much confufion on natural hiftory, and 
rather tends to embarrafs than inftruft a Undent in the 
fcience, I have thought it belt to defcribe this animal 
as a fpecies of flying-fquirrel, and to feparate the 
flying-fquirrels from the genus Sciurus, with which 
Linnaeus had conjoined them, and to form them into 
a genus by the name of Petaurus. 
This perhaps may be thought an unneceffary piece 
of exadnefs ; yet there is fomething fo peculiar in the 
expanded proceifes of fkin by which the flying-fquir- 
Dd 2 rels 
