24 THE MAN-LIKE APES. i 



vian Society, studied this animal, and his careful 

 description of it, entitled " Beschrrjving van der 

 Groote Borneosche Orang-outang of de Oost-In- 

 dische Pongo," is contained in the same volume of 

 the Batavian Society's Transactions. After Von 

 Wurmb had drawn up his description he states, 

 in a letter dated Batavia, Feb. 18, 1781,* that the 

 specimen was sent to Europe in brandy to be placed 

 in the collection of the Prince of Orange; " un- 

 fortunately," he continues, " we hear that the ship 

 has been wrecked." Von "Wurmb died in the 

 course of the year 1781, the letter in which this 

 passage occurs being the last he wrote; but in his 

 posthumous papers, published in the fourth part 

 of the Transactions of the Batavian Society, there 

 is a brief description, with measurements, of a fe- 

 male Pongo four feet high. 



Did either of these original specimens, on 

 which Von Wurmb's descriptions are based, ever 

 reach Europe? It is commonly supposed that they 

 did; but I doubt the fact. For, appended to the 

 memoir " De l'Ourang-outang," in the collected 

 edition of Camper's works, tome i., pp. 61—66, is a 

 note by Camper himself, referring to Von "Wurmb's 

 papers, and continuing thus: — " Heretofore, tins 

 kind of ape had never been known in Europe. 

 Radermacher has had the kindness to send me the 

 skull of one of these animals, which measured 



* " Briefe des Herrn v. Wurmb unci des H. Baron von 

 Wollzogen. Gotha, 1794." 



