XXIII 



FIGHTING AMONG WILD ANIMALS 



QUARRELS and combats between wild animals in a 

 state of nature are almost invariably due to one of two 

 causes attack and defense in a struggle for prey, or 

 the jealousy of males during the mating season. With rare 

 exceptions, battles of the former class occur between animals of 

 different Orders, teeth and claws against horns and hoofs, for 

 instance; and it is a fight to the death. Hunger forces the 

 aggressor to attack something, and the intended victim fights 

 because it is attacked. The question of good or ill temper 

 does not enter in. On both sides it is a case of "must," and 

 neither party has any option. Such combats are tests of 

 agility, strength, and staying powers, and, in a few cases, of 

 thickness of bone and hide. 



How Orang-Utans Fight. Of the comparatively few ani- 

 mals which do draw blood of their own kind through ill temper 

 or jealousy, I have never encountered any more given to inter- 

 necine strife than orang-utans. Their fighting methods, and 

 their love of fighting, are highly suggestive of the temper and 

 actions of the human tough. They fight by biting, and usually 

 it is the fingers and toes that suffer. Of twenty-seven orang- 

 utans I shot in Borneo, and twelve more that were shot for me 

 by native hunters, five were fighters, and had had one or more 

 fingers or toes bitten off in battle. Those specimens were 

 taken in the days when the museums of America were one 

 and all destitute of anthropoid apes. 



A gorilla, chimpanzee, or orang-utan, being heavy of body, 

 short of neck, and by no means nimble footed, cannot spring 

 upon an adversary, choose a vulnerable spot, and bite to kill; 

 but what it lacks in agility it makes up in length and strength 



