A. MAMMALIA. QUADRCMAXA. 



15 



in the general form of the body we find a great 

 diversity in this order. The apes and monkeys pre- 

 sent a greater or less resemblance to the human spe- 

 cies ; the baboons are more quadruped in their appear- 

 ance; and the lemurs resemble ordinary quadrupeds 

 in their form. The development of the tail, also, is 

 very variable ; some, such as the apes, being perfectly 

 destitute of this appendage, which is also rudimentary 

 in several of the baboons, whilst the majority of the 

 monkeys and lemurs are well provided with tails, 

 and these in the American monkeys are often prehen- 

 sile, thus furnishing these creatures as it were with a 

 fifth hand, which is of great service to them in their 

 arboreal gambols. 



The resemblance in the form of the brain and skull 

 in the apes to that of the same parts in the human 

 species, is greatest in the young animals, and it is 

 owing to this, and to the fact that most of the specimens 

 of the larger apes brought to Europe have been very 

 young, that we are to attribute the exaggerated notions 

 frequently entertained with regard to the extent of this 

 similarity. In the young animals the brain is larger 

 even in proportion to the rest of the body than in full- 

 grown specimens; and as long as the dentition is con- 

 fined to the milk teeth, the jaws are but little produced, 

 so that the forehead is high, and the facial angle very 

 large ; but as the first teeth are shed and the permanent 

 ones produced, the space required for their accommo- 

 dation becomes greatly increased, and the jaws are 

 necessarily prolonged, whilst no corresponding change 

 takes place in the dimensions of the cranium, and thus 

 the face eventually acquires the form of a prominent 

 muzzle. In the change of teeth, the canines acquire a 

 great development, crossing each other, and interlocking 

 like those of a carnivorous animal, so that the jaws of 

 an adult ape or baboon present an aspect almost as 

 formidable as those of one of the larger cats; and as a 

 consequence of this great size of the canines, gaps are 

 left between these teeth and the incisors or molars, to 

 permit the lodgment of the canines of one jaw by the 

 side of those of the other. The molars, in form, greatly 

 resemble those of the human subject. 



The remaining general characters of the order may 

 be dismissed in a few words. Except in the genus 

 GaleopithecuS) already alluded to, the orbits, or bony 

 sockets of the eyes, are completely closed, as in man. 

 The external ears are usually small, but variable in 

 form, sometimes resembling those of the human species, 

 sometimes erect, as in the cat The fingers are gene- 

 rally furnished with flat nails, but some species have 

 curved, compressed claws, either on the whole or on 

 some of the fingers. The mammge are almost always 

 placed on the breast, and two in number ; in the Galeo- 

 pithecus, there are four pectoral teats ; and in the 

 Cheiromys, a doubtful species of the order, these organs 

 are situated on the hinder part of the abdomen. 



In their geographical distribution upon the face of the 

 earth, the Quadrumana must be regarded as a tropical 

 group. They are found in the forests and rocky deserts 

 of Southern Asia, of Africa, and of South America, 

 where they live in troops, and feed principally upon 

 fruits, often descending to plunder the gardens and 

 fields of the inhabitants. In Africa, the range of the 



baboons extends as far south as the Cape of Good 

 Hope; whilst a species of baboon-like monkey, the 

 well-known Barbary ape, not only occurs on the south- 

 ern shores of the Mediterranean, but even crosses to 

 the European coast, and lives in numerous troops upon 

 the rock of Gibraltar. 



This is at present the most northern range of any 

 species of the order Quadrumana ; but the fossil remain* 

 of these animals found in some European tertiary for- 

 mations prove, that at a former period of the earth's 

 history several species of monkeys and apes lived upon 

 the continent of Europe, and even in England. In 

 some fresh-water sands at Kyson in Suffolk, the tooth 

 and part of the jaw of a Macacos, a monkey allied to 

 the Barbary ape, have been found ; these strata belong 

 to the eocene, or earliest tertiary formations. In the 

 miocene, or middle tertiary fresh-water strata, at Sansar. 

 in the south of France, M. Lartet in 1837 discovered 

 the first known fossil remains of a quadrumanous ani- 

 mal, considered to be allied to the Gibbons, which are 

 now confined to the islands of the Eastern Archipelago; 

 and in 1856 that geologist also found in the same 

 region, the lower jaw and humerus of a gigantic ape, 

 larger than any known living or fossil species, and pre- 

 senting, in some respects, a nearer approach to the 

 human species than even the chimpanzee. Other fossil 

 species of monkeys have been found in the south of 

 Europe at Montpellier and near Athens, both belonging 

 to the Indian genus Semnopithecus. In the Sivalik 

 hills of Northern India, the remains of several species 

 of monkeys have been discovered by Messrs. Fal- 

 coner and Cautley, and there is no doubt that as the 

 geological investigation of the warmer regions of the 

 Old World advances, other forms of Quadrumana will 

 be found. The fossil monkeys which have been dis- 

 covered in some caves in Brazil, belong to the same 

 group as those now inhabiting the South American 

 continent ; those are considered to have lived in the 

 pliocene, or latest tertiary period; and it is interesting 

 to find that ia this, as in some other cases, there was 

 then the samf difference in the type of the mammalian 

 inhabitants of the two hemispheres, as at the present 

 day. 



When we examine the various animals belonging to 

 this order, we find that the greater portion of them may 

 be included in two sections the Monkeys (Simice) 

 and the Lemurs (Prosimice). In the former, the inci- 

 sors are always four in number in each jaw, and the 

 rest of the dentition presents a certain resemblance 

 to that of man ; the nails of the fingers are similar, 

 either flattened or claw-like, and those of the thumbs 

 always flat. In the lemurs the number of incisors is 

 variable ; and the first finger of the hinder hands is 

 always furnished with a curved, compressed claw. In 

 both these groups the hinder thumb is opposable, and 

 this is also the case with the thumb of the anterior \ 

 extremities, except in those cases in which it is rudi- 

 mentary or altogether wanting. There are other 

 points of relationship between these two sections, which 

 may consequently be regarded as forming the true 

 Quadrumana ; but, besides these, we have to dispose 

 of two other groups, each including only a single family, 

 1 and but one or two species, the characters of which am 



