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Updated: May 15, 2025
It differs a little from the typical Cebidae in its teeth, the incisors being oblique and, in the upper jaw, converging, so as to leave a gap between the outermost and the canine teeth. It lives in small troops among the crowns of the lofty trees, subsisting on fruits of various kinds.
But the teeth which are the most frequently overcrowded are the lower incisors. The upper incisors are less overcrowded, being commonly pressed outwards by the lower arc of teeth fitting inside them in biting. The lower incisors are correspondingly pressed inwards and closer together.
One word more to complete my description of the teeth: that portion of them which is in the jaw is called the root; and the incisors, which cannot work hard because, like the gig-horses, they have but little resisting power, possess only small and short roots; whereas the canines, whose duty it is to tear the food sideways, would run the risk of being dragged out and left sticking in the substances they are at work upon, if they were not well secured; these, therefore, have roots which go much deeper into the jaw, and in consequence of this they give us more pain than the others when the dentist extracts them: those famous eye-teeth, which so terrify people on such occasions, are the canines of the upper jaw, and lie, in fact, just below the eye.
The wine wrought with the Transylvanians, and they all jargoned together at once, and laughed at the jokes passing among them. One old gentleman had a peculiar fascination from the infantile innocence of his gums when he threw his head back to laugh, and showed an upper jaw toothless except for two incisors, standing guard over the chasm between.
Our Professor brought them home with him and wished us to try them, but I am afraid that, with the conservative instinct of young animals, we distrusted the unknown, and we did not venture. The Professor considered that our molar teeth clearly indicated grain, roots, and nuts as our food, and the incisors as clearly suggested fruit, but at that time he was in some doubt about the canine teeth.
They would play the walrus the same trick that the incisors of rodents are apt to do when they have not work enough to wear them down; that is, stop up the entrance of its mouth, were it not that the lower jaw is contracted in front, in order to fit into the space between the two canines, which thus form a sort of passage in which it manoeuvres freely.
The teeth were not as in other human beings incisors, canines, and molars: they were all exactly alike, above and below, each tooth a gleaming white triangle, broad at the gum where it touched its companion teeth, and with a point sharp as the sharpest-pointed dagger. They were like the teeth of a shark or crocodile.
If you will examine the incisors of any rodent, whether it be a rat, a mouse, a rabbit, or a beaver, you will see that the tips are "bevelled" off just like the edge of a chisel. This shape is absolutely necessary to keep the tooth in working order. How is this object to be attained? In the solution of this problem we may see one of the many links which connect art and nature.
Yet every now and then the beast would flash out upon me beyond doubt or denial. An ugly-looking man, a hunch-backed human savage to all appearance, squatting in the aperture of one of the dens, would stretch his arms and yawn, showing with startling suddenness scissor-edged incisors and sabre-like canines, keen and brilliant as knives.
Those I talked with said the custom was entirely discontinued, although formerly heads of other Punans, Malays, or Dayaks had been taken. These natives, following no doubt an observance prevalent among the Dayaks, had some of their teeth filed off in the upper jaw, the four incisors, two cuspids, and two bicuspids.
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