Waterbury evening Democrat., 1903-03-14
 CANNOT FIND ITS SPECIES.
Singular Animal Brought from the East Indies Puzzles English
 Naturnlists.

A very fine example of the bin turong farctictis binturong) has been received at the geological gar, dens, says the London Standard of recent date. This curious animal is a native of the East Indies, ranging from Assam southward through Siam and the Malay peninsula to Sumatrn and Java A large speci- men will measure about five feet in total length, of which the tail counts for nearly half. The long, coarse hair is black, but there is gray wash on the head and fore limbs and there is a little white over the eyes and on the throat; the ears are short and carry. long tufts of hair. It's English book name, "bear cat" is modelled on it's generic ap- pellation and records the difficulty early naturalists experienced in as- certaining the animals true place in their schemes of classification
 Although it was at one time placed with the bears, it is now regarded as closely allied to the palm civets. In matters of diet the binturong is not hard to please. When opportuni- ty serves it will take small man. malls, birds, insects and worms. When these cannot be secured it will support itself on fruits, and in cap tivity it will take fruit of ali kinds readily. The binturong is more ac- tive by night than in the daytime, and lives almost entirely among the branches of the trees of the forest regions in which it is found It is remarkable as being the only true mammal of the eastern hemisphere which has prehensile tail. It can wind this organ around branch and thus the tail aids the animal in it's arboreal life
 Biyytth showed, many years ago, that the young of this species could hang on to a bough by the tip of the tail. Whether the adults can suspend themselves in this manner has been doubted. There can. how ever, be no question that the tail is of considerable service to them, and that they use this fifth hand" as 8 holdfast. The example which has just arrived at the gardens is near " adult, and, though somewhat shy, is fairly tame, for. with a little coax ing, it will come to the front of the cage to take fruit from visitors. Like all new arrivals, however, it is somewhat distrustful. If one ad- vances too near it darts forward with splitting noise, like an angry cat, while the paw delivers q round- handed blow, like that of bear.
 New Fruits and Plants in yucatan.
 The United States consul at Progreso says that the fields and gardens of Yucatan are filled with useful vege- tables and fragrant herbs unknown to the outer world. In the cultivated fields are grown species of Indian corn, beans, squashes and tubers for which, in this country, we have no name, be- cause we have never seen nor heard of them. In the forests and jungles grow wild fruits, already excellent ill 0uality, which could be made delicious bv scientific cultivation. Mir. Thomp- son. the consul, ayers that there are half a score of wild fruits which offer more promising results to cultivation than ever did the bitter wild almond, which was the progenitor of the peach. There are six varieties of Indian corn sn Yucatan, and the natives speak of this plant as "the grace of oGd. .''-- Mouths Companion.