

AND ITS INHABITANTS 139 



cene. While the sub-human primates are now extinct on the 

 Asiatic mainland north of the great Himalayan uplift, they 

 still persist in tropical Asia, in India, Indo-China, the East 

 Indies, Japan, and the Philippines. They are also extant in 

 tropical Africa. 



Anthropoid apes. Man's nearest blood relatives, whatever 

 may be his prejudice in the matter, are the so-called anthropoid 

 or man-like apes : the orang, chimpanzee, gorilla, and gibbon, 

 all descendants from the same stock which gave rise to hu- 

 manity and perhaps fallen to their present condition through 

 being the victims of circumstances. That man owes his higher 

 estate, at least in part, to his past environments we shall 

 endeavor to show. 



Of the great apes, the orang-utan is one of the most familiar, 

 for it and the chimpanzee are the kinds most frequently seen 

 in captivity. The orang is readily distinguished, however, by 

 its reddish hair. It is rarely more than four feet tall but is 

 relatively of great girth, which, together with an arm spread 

 of upward of seven and a half feet, gives it a remarkable 

 appearance. The jaws are powerful, with large canine teeth, 

 but the hands are the chief weapons of defense. The great 

 size of the orang renders it less agile than the gibbon, for 

 instance (see page 140), and it climbs somewhat laboriously as 

 does a man. It is highly intelligent but sluggish, stirred to 

 action only by some powerful incentive such as hunger. 

 Orangs are today confined to the dense somber forests of 

 Borneo and Sumatra, but the fossil remains of their ancestors 

 come from the Siwalik Hills on the Asiatic mainland and thus 

 betray the course of their migration. 



The chimpanzee and gorilla are both African in distribution, 

 although also of Asiatic stock. They are perhaps the nearest 

 to mankind in blood relationship. The chimpanzee may 

 readily be distinguished from the orang by its black hair. It is 

 also taller, although never exceeding five feet, and is less bulky 



