42 
MADAGASCAR 
ally acts as a powerful balancing pole, for the lemurs 
climb nimbly, and in their emphatically arboreal life they 
make considerable leaps like squirrels. In exceptional 
cases the tail is quite short, and the fore limbs are at 
the same time more muscular. 
Babakota (Indris brevicaudatus). 
These animals have none of the impudence of monk¬ 
eys, and are somewhat uninteresting in captivity. 
Lemurs are held in high honour by all Malagasy, and 
foreigners often get into difficulties when they kill these 
animals for their skins. The largest species, called Indri 
or Babakota [Indris brevicaudatus')^ is not quite three feet 
in length; it is somewhat variable in colour, but the hair 
