HUNTING GORILLAS 191 
natives, made a rather remarkable description of the 
animals, part of which is as follows: 
Its height is above five feet, it is disproportionately broad 
across the shoulders, thickly covered with coarse black hair, 
which is said to be similar in its arrangement to that of the 
Engé-eco (the chimpanzee). With age it becomes gray, which 
fact has given rise to the report that both animals are seen of 
different colors. : 
Their gait is shuffling, the motion of the body, which is never 
upright as in man, but bent forward, is somewhat rolling, or 
from side to side. The arms being longer than those of the 
chimpanzee it does not stoop as much in walking; like that 
animal it makes progression by thrusting its arms forward, 
resting the hands on the ground and then giving the body a half 
jumping, half swinging motion between them. In this act it is 
said not to flex the fingers as does the chimpanzee, resting on 
the knuckles, but to extend them, thus making a fulcrum of the 
hand. When it assumes the walking posture to which it is said 
to be much inclined, it balances its huge body by flexing the 
arms upward. They live in bands, but are not so numerous as 
the chimpanzees; the females generally exceed the other sex in 
number. My informants all agree in the assertion that but one 
adult male is seen in a band; that when the young males grow 
up a contest takes place for mastery, and the strongest, by kill- 
ing and driving out the others, establishes himself as the head 
of the community. The silly stories about their carrying off 
women from the native towns, and vanquishing the elephants, 
related by voyagers and widely copied into books, are unhesi- 
tatingly denied. They have been averred of the chimpanzee, 
but this is still more preposterous. They probably had their 
origin in the marvelous accounts given by the natives, of the 
Engé-ena, to credulous traders. 
Their dwellings, if they may be so called, are similar to those 
of the chimpanzee, consisting simply of a few sticks and leafy 
branches supported by the crotches and limbs of trees; they 
afford no shelter, and are occupied only at night. 
They are exceedingly ferocious, and always offensive in their 
habits, never running from man as does the chimpanzee. They 
