30 General Monthly Meeting, ' [Feb. 7, 



The brief observation made by Battell in west tropical Africa, 

 1590, recorded in Purchas*s " Pilgrimages, or Relations of the World," 

 1748, of the nature and habits of the large human-like ape which he 

 calls " pongo," more decidedly refers to the gorilla. Other notices, as 

 by Nieremberg and Bosman, applied by Buffon to Battell's pongo, 

 were deemed valueless by Cuvier, who altogether rejected the conclu- 

 sions of his great predecessor as to the existence of any such ape. 

 " This name of pongo or boggo, given in Africa to the chimpanzee or 

 to the mandril, has been applied," writes Cuvier, " by Buffon to a pre- 

 tended great species of ourang-utan, which was nothing more than the 

 imaginary product of his combinations." After the publication of 

 Cuvier's " Regne Animal," the supposed species was, by the high 

 authority of its author, banished from natural history ; it has only 

 been authentically reintroduced since the intelligent attention of Dr. 

 Savage was directed to the skull which he first saw at the Gaboon in 

 1847, and took Professor Owen's opinion upon. 



[The above lecture was illustrated by life-size drawings of the 

 gorilla and chimpanzee, executed with characteristic accuracy and 

 vigour by Mr. Joseph Wolf ; also by diagrams of the skeletons of the 

 anthropoid apes and man, by Messrs. Scharf and Erxleben.] 



[R. O.] 



GENERAL MONTHLY MEETING, 



Monday, February 7, 1859. 



William Pole, Esq. M.A. F.R.S. Treasurer and Vice-President, 



in the Chair. 



The Earl of Ashburnham, 

 John Derby AUcroft, Esq. 

 Capt. Augustus T. Hamilton, and 

 Mrs. M. A. Newman Smith. 



were duly elected Members of the Royal Institution. 



George F. Chambers, Esq. 

 was admitted a Member of the Royal Institution. 



The following Presents were announced, and the thanks of the 

 Members returned for the same : — 



From 

 India Office: Committee of Finance, 8fc. — Catalogue of Lepidopterous Insects in 

 the Museum of the East India Company. By T. Horsfield and F. Moore. 

 Vol. 1. 8vo. 1857. 



