OF THE MAN-LIKE APES 



211 



lasted till four o'clock in the afternoon, when we determined 

 to shoot him ; in which I succeeded very well, and indeed 

 better than I ever shot from a boat before ; for the bullet 

 went just into the side of his chest, so that he was not much 

 damaged. We got him into the prow still living, and 

 bound him fast, and next morning he died of his wounds. 

 All Pontiana came on board to see him when we arrived." 

 Palm gives his height from the head to the heel as 49 inches. 

 A very intelligent German officer, Baron Von Wurmb, 

 who at this time held a post in the Dutch East India 

 service, and was Secretary of the Batavian Society, studied 

 this animal, and his careful description of it, entitled 



FIG. 7. The Pongo Skull, sent by Radermacher to Camper, after 

 Camper's original sketches, as reproduced by Lucae. 



" Beschrijving van der Groote Borneosche Orang-outang 

 of de Oost-Indische Pongo," is contained in the same 

 volume of the Batavian Society's Transactions. After 

 Von Wurmb had drawn up his description he states, in 

 a letter dated Batavia, Feb. 18, 1781,* that the specimen 

 was sent to Europe in brandy to be placed in the collec- 

 tion of the Prince of Orange ; " unfortunately," he con- 

 tinues, " we hear that the ship has been wrecked." Von 

 Wurmb died in the course of the year 1781, the letter in 

 which this passage occurs being the last he wrote ; but 

 in his posthumous papers, published in the fourth part of 

 the Transactions of the Batavian Society, there is a brief 



* " Briefe des Herrn v. Wurmb und des H. Baron von Wollzogen. 

 Gotha, 1794." 



