202 PON GO 



bites off a few of these first, and then, making a small hole, tears open 

 the fruits with its powerful fingers. 



"The Mias rarely descends to the ground, except when, pressed 

 by hunger, it seeks for succulent shoots by the river side ; or, in very 

 dry weather, has to search after water, of which it generally finds 

 sufficient in the hollows of leaves. Once only I saw two half grown 

 Ourangs on the ground in a dry hollow at the foot of the Simunjon 

 hill. They were playing together standing erect, and grasping each 

 other by the arms. It may safely be stated, however, that the Ourang 

 never walks erect, unless when using its hands to support itself by 

 branches overhead or when attacked. Representations of its walking 

 with a stick are entirely imaginary. 



"The Dyaks all declare that the Mias is never attacked by any 

 animal in the forest, with two rare exceptions ; and the accounts I 

 received of them are so curious that I give them nearly in the words 

 of my informants, old Dyak chiefs, who had lived all their lives in 

 the places where the animal is most abundant. The first of whom I 

 enquired said, 'No animal is strong enough to hurt the Mias ; and the 

 only creature he ever fights with is the crocodile. When there is no 

 fruit in the jungle, he goes to seek food on the banks of the river, 

 where there are plenty of young shoots that he likes, and fruits that 

 grow close to the water. Then the crocodile sometimes tries to seize 

 him, but the Mias gets upon him and beats him with his hands and 

 feet, and tears him and kills him.' He added that he had once seen 

 such a fight, and that he believes that the Mias is always the victor. 



"My next informant was the Orang Kayas, or chief of the Balow 

 Dyaks on the Semunjon River. He said, 'the Mias has no enemies; 

 no animals dare attack it but the crocodile and the python. He always 

 kills the crocodile by main strength, standing upon it, pulling open its 

 jaws and ripping up its throat. If a python attacks a Mias, he seizes 

 it with his hands, and then bites it, and soon kills it. The Mias is 

 very strong; there is no animal in the jungle so strong as he.' " 



In regard to the size of the adult Ourang, Mr Wallace sums up 

 the evidence gained from his own experience and the published 

 accounts of others as follows : "I have myself examined the bodies of 

 seventeen freshly killed Orangs, all of which were carefully measured, 

 and of seven of them I preserved the skeleton. Of this extensive 

 series, sixteen were fully adult, nine being males and seven females. 

 The adult males of the large Orangs only varied from 4 feet 1 inch to 



