62 APES AND MONKEYS. 



ably smaller than the siamang, standing about thirty inches in height ; and it is 

 also of a lighter and more slender build. Although subject to great individual 

 variation in colour, it may be always recognised by the pale colour of the hands 

 and feet, of which the upper surfaces are usually either white or yellowish- white. 

 Another distinctive characteristic is to be found in the usual presence round the 

 black skin of the naked face of a complete ring of more or less nearly white 

 hairs ; which, as is well shown in our illustration, imparts a most peculiar physi- 

 ognomy to the animal. Occasionally, however, this white ring is almost absent ; 

 different individuals showing a gradation in this respect from those in which it is 

 but very slightly developed, to those in which it attains its full proportions. The 

 general colour of the body and limbs of this gibbon varies from a full black, through 

 various fulvous shades, to a yellowish- white. In opposition to what usually obtains 

 in Mammals some individuals of this species have the back lighter than the under 

 parts of the body ; and it may occasionally be much variegated. 



The white-handed gibbon is found throughout the Malay Peninsula, as far 

 north as the province of Tenasserim, and may possibly reach into Lower Pegu. 

 It inhabits the forests skirting the mountains, at elevations varying from about 

 three thousand to three thousand five hundred feet above the sea-level. 



Colonel Tickell has given an excellent account of this gibbon, 

 both in its wild state and in confinement. It appears from this 

 description that the white-handed gibbon is somewhat more heavily built and less 

 agile than the hoolock (to be noticed next); while it walks on the ground less 

 steadily. It is also said to differ from the hoolock in its manner of drinking 

 scooping up water in its hands, and thus carrying it to its mouth, instead of 

 applying its mouth directly to the surface of the water. The same observer also 

 notices a great difference in the voice of the two species. The white-handed 

 gibbons are also stated to go in smaller parties than the other species ; the number 

 in a drove, according to Colonel Tickell, being usually from six to twenty. They 

 depend almost entirely on their hands in passing from bough to bough, and use 

 their feet to carry food. He has seen a drove of these apes escape in this manner 

 with the plunder stolen from a garden made by the Karen tribes near the forests 

 which they frequent. Like other species of the group, the white-handed gibbon 

 almost invariably has but a single young one at a time. The young are born at 

 the commencement of the winter season ; and cling to the body of the mother for 

 nearly seven months, after which they shift for themselves. 



THE HOOLOCK (Hylobates hoolock). 



One of the best known of all the gibbons is the hoolock, or white-browed 

 gibbon, which, as we have said, takes it name from its characteristic dissyllabic 

 cry. This is the only species which occurs in India, where it is confined to the 

 north-eastern districts, being found in the hill ranges south of the Assam valley, 

 as well as in the provinces of Sylhet, Cachar, and Manipur. Thence it ranges to the 

 east and southwards into the hill-forests of the Irawadi valley near Bhamo, in 

 Upper Burma, and in the neighbourhood of Chittagong and Arakan. It may also 

 occur near Martaban, in Upper Tenasserim ; and the extent of its range on the 



