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The best information we possess is that, based almost wholly on direct European testimony respecting the Gibbons; the next best evidence relates to the Orangs; while our knowledge of the habits of the Chimpanzee and the Gorilla stands much in need of support and enlargement by additional testimony from instructed European eye-witnesses.
Upon a narrow strip of land along the Gulf of Guinea, from Cape Palmas to the Gaboon, live two so-called species of chimpanzee; upon the islands of Sumatra and Borneo live three or four orangs; upon the shores of the Gulf of Bengal, including the neighborhood of Calcutta, Burmah, Malacca, Sumatra, Borneo, and Java together, ten or eleven species of gibbons, all of which are the nearest relatives to the human family, some being as large as certain races of men; altogether, fifteen species of anthropoid monkeys playing their part in the animal population of the world upon an area not equaling by any means the surface of Europe.
Two centuries and a half have passed away since Battell told his stories about the 'greater' and the 'lesser monsters' to Purchas, and it has taken nearly that time to arrive at the clear result that there are four distinct kinds of Anthropoids in Eastern Asia, the Gibbons and the Orangs; in Western Africa, the Chimpanzees and the Gorilla.
The third group, or Orangs Boumans, resemble ordinary beings, but have the power of making themselves invisible. They come down from the mountains to buy supplies, but have not been seen for some time. Westenberg, from whom this information is quoted, regards the last class as being proscribed Battaks, who have fled for refuge to the mountains.
It was feeding on succulent shoots by the waterside: a fact which surprised the professor, for his inquiries and experience had hitherto taught him that orangs never eat such food except when starving. The fat and vigorous condition in which this animal was, forbade the idea of starvation.
Though I have expressed my doubts of the existence of an unknown species of large monkey in a continent which appears entirely destitute of quadrumanous animals of the family of the orangs, cynocephali, mandrils, and pongos; yet it should be remembered that almost all matters of popular belief, even those most absurd in appearance, rest on real facts, but facts ill observed.
My specimens were all from the northwest coast of Borneo; those of the Dutch from the west and south coasts; and no specimen has yet reached Europe exceeding these dimensions, although the total number of skins and skeletons must amount to over a hundred. Strange to say, however, several persons declare that they have measured Orangs of a much larger size.
And indeed nothing could look much less like the Chimpanzees or the Orangs, then known, than the Pongo; for all the specimens of Chimpanzee and Orang which had been observed were small of stature, singularly human in aspect, gentle and docile; while Wurmb's Pongo was a monster almost twice their size, of vast strength and fierceness, and very brutal in expression; its great projecting muzzle, armed with strong teeth, being further disfigured by the outgrowth of the cheeks into fleshy lobes.
Only once I saw two half-grown Orangs on the ground in a dry hollow at the foot of the Simunjon hill. They were playing together, standing erect, and grasping each other by the arms. It may be safely stated, however, that the Orang never walks erect, unless when using its hands to support itself by branches overhead or when attacked.
Two centuries and a half have passed away since Battell told his stories about the 'greater' and the 'lesser monsters' to Purchas, and it has taken nearly that time to arrive at the clear result that there are four distinct kinds of Anthropoids in Eastern Asia, the Gibbons and the Orangs; in Western Africa, the Chimpanzees and the Gorilla.
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