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So impetuous was the attack of the man-ape that he found his hold before the anthropoid could prevent him a savage hold, with strong jaws closed upon a pulsing jugular, and there he clung, with closed eyes, while his fingers sought another hold upon the shaggy throat. It was then that Meriem opened her eyes. At the sight before her they went wide. "Korak!" she cried. "Korak! My Korak!
Indeed, a person who kills a man-ape, they regard as a murderer; and so when Wallace announced to his attendants that he wanted to secure several specimens of these "wild men of the woods," they cried, "Alas! he is making a collection: it will be our turn next!" And they fled in terror.
But in its new habitat it was exposed to a series of novel conditions that must have exerted a healthful and stimulating influence upon its mind. If it had remained in the trees we should probably to-day have only a man-ape still. Leaving their safe shelter for the ground, it became exposed to new dangers and was forced to fit itself to fresh conditions.
"Yoh! the man-ape was dead, and the chief's wife broke the great teeth from the jaw, and cut off the hairs above the eyes. She burnt them, and mixed them with his blood, for Muata to drink. Muata drank and was strong. "So those two passed through the forest, through the silent dark of the woods, in pain and hunger.
This, for the reasons given, rendered the adaptation of the man-ape to life in the trees inferior to that of the long-armed apes; while, as has just been said, it unfitted it to walk on the ground either as a quadruped or in the jumping method of its fellow anthropoids. In short, the biped attitude was much the best suited to its organization and the one it was most likely to assume.
The most skilful in this exercise are some species of baboons, which can hurl branches, stones, or hard clods with much dexterity. It is of interest to find existing apes availing themselves of their grasping power in this manner, since it leads us irresistibly to the conclusion that the man-ape may have done the same thing.
"Given certain conditions, and inevitably the human form will most certainly become the supreme creature, superior to all the others. "However, suppose the planetary conditions are entirely different. I conceive it entirely possible for one of the other animals to forge ahead of the man-ape; quite possible, Smith," as the engineer started to object, "if only the conditions are different ENOUGH.
Yet it is doubtful if the man-ape long remained a specially arboreal animal. The varied length of arm in the anthropoid apes was doubtless of early origin, and in all probability man's ancestor had originally a shorter arm than its related species. If so, this must have rendered it less agile in trees than other forms.
Of all animals the man-ape was the best adapted for such a struggle. The other anthropoid apes, while favored by the formation of their hands, lacked that freedom of the arms to which man mainly owes his success.
If any disadvantage attended the shortening of the arms of the man-ape, to the extent that this may have taken place in the tree, it was probably correlated with some advantage. In the various instances of short-armed animals cited this appears to have been the case, and it was probably so in man's ancestral form.
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