50 THE MAN-LIKE APES I 



his bed before the sun is well above the horizon 

 and has dissipated the mists. He gets up about 

 nine, and goes to bed again about five ; but some- 

 times not till late in the twilight. He lies some- 

 times on his back ; or, by way of change, turns on 

 one side or the other, drawing his limbs up to his 

 body, and resting his head on his hand. When 

 the night is cold, windy, or rainy, he usually 

 covers his body with a heap of Pandanus, 

 Nipa, or Fern leaves, like those of which his 

 bed is made, and he is especially careful to 

 wrap up his head in them. It is this habit 

 of covering himself up which has probably 

 led to the fable that the Orang builds huts in 

 the trees. 



Although the Orang resides mostly amid the 

 boughs of great trees, during the daytime, he is 

 very rarely seen squatting on a thick branch, as 

 other apes, and particularly the Gibbons, do. The 

 Orang, on the contrary, confines himself to the 

 slender leafy branches, so that he is seen right at 

 the top of the trees, a mode of life which is closely 

 related to the constitution of his hinder limbs, 

 and especially to that of his seat. For this is 

 provided with no callosities, such as are possessed 

 by many of the lower apes, and even by the 

 Gibbons ; and those bones of the pelvis, which are 

 termed the ischia, and which form the solid 

 framework of the surface on which the body rests 

 in the sitting posture, are not expanded like those 



