350 M. Vrolik's Rescarchca on the Comparative 



pretty perfect in the ourang-outang, it exhibits in that animal 

 a disproportionate length ; but in the Chimpanzee the fingers 

 are shorter, the thumb better formed, and the palm of the hand 

 broader. I cannot determine whether the palm of the Chim- 

 panzee can form a hollow, like that of man, but I have often 

 satisfied myself that that of the ourang-outang is incapable of 

 doing so. When the ourang-outang of our Zoological Garden 

 makes use of his hand, whether it be to seize on any object, or 

 in any of the artificial movements he is caused to execute, he 

 does it Avith a certain degree of awkwardness, which demon- 

 strates his inferiority in this respect as compared with man. 

 The last director of our menagerie amused himself by making 

 it dine at his table ; but although it had learned to imitate all 

 the movements of a civilized man, to present its empty plate, 

 hold out its glass, and eat with a spoon, it sufficiently shewed 

 that its hand would not allow it to attain the dexterity of man. 

 For example, in taking a plate or any other object, it never 

 held its hand extended and open, as a man does, but closed 

 the hand, bending the fingers very much. This mode of curving 

 the fingers was extremely familiar to it. I never recollect of 

 seeing its fingers completely extended. All this shews us that 

 the hand of the ourang-outang is well adapted to grasp the 

 branches of a tree ; that in this respect it is an organ of mo- 

 tion of great perfection, and in every respect appropriate to 

 the animal's mode of life, but that, in all other respects, it is 

 inferior to that of man. I remarked the same thing in the 

 ash-coloured gibbons of our menagerie. This inferior degree 

 of aptitude in the hand of animals to serve all the purposes 

 which it fulfils in man, is owing to the disproportionate length 

 of the fingers, and, in particular, the inferior perfection and 

 the situation of the thumb. By the disposition of its muscles 

 the thumb of monkeys is not made for that variety and great 

 freedom of motion peculiar to man. Certainly that of the 

 Chimpanzee approaches nearest the human thumb, and yet the 

 great flexor muscle is sometimes wanting, and the smaller 

 abductor and antagonist of the thumb are much less developed 

 than in man. In the other monkeys, the great abductor and 

 small extensor of the thumb are confounded, in so nuich that 

 there appears there, as in all the other muscles of the anterior 



