of an Orang Otang. ATS 
which covers the palms and the inside of the fingers is strongly 
furrowed by those parallel and spiral lines, which in our own 
hands, those of the apes generally, and in many of the P/anti- 
grada, announce the acuteness of the sense of touch. The skin 
is of a reddish-brown colour; and the nails, which are about 
an inch in length, are darker. The thumb, as in all these 
creatures, is comparatively short, but extremely powerful ; and, 
as before observed, placed nearly at right angles with the meta- 
tarsal bones. | 
'These gigantic specimens having thus all the characters which 
pertain to the hinder hands of the true Simia Satyrus of Linnæus, 
or the Red Orang Otang of the Eastern Islands, of which very 
young individuals have occasionally been brought to Europe, 
it becomes a question, whether we are to refer them to that 
species; whether we should regard them as belonging to a spe- 
cies very similar, yet distinct from that animal, as the Pongo, 
described by Worms, has been thought to be; or whether we 
should consider these two animals, the Simia Satyrus and. the 
Pongo, to be the same species of different ages, as they have been 
supposed to be by Cuvier, Desmarest, and others, who regard 
the Pongo as the adult animal. Now, certain it is that they very 
closely resemble each other in many of their characters ; and I 
should be strongly inclined to acquiesce in this latter supposi- 
tion of their identity, could difficulties be overcome which have 
arisen from an examination of several skeletons of Orang Otangs, 
for opportunities of doing which, I am especially indebted to 
Mr. Clift and Mr. Brookes. tede MONS SSD 800 CERN 1 ; — | 
Among these difficulties, the most important arises from a 
difference in the number of the vertebræ ; for in the perfect 
skeleton of the Pongo at the Royal College of Surgeons, I find 
five lumbar vertebræ instead of four, which latter is the number 
in all the specimens of S. Satyrus that have fallen under my 
3P2 observation. 
