100 THE NATUEAL HISTOEY OF 



reetness, the other pans of the relations have ahxaya 

 been received with a doubt. 



The black orang is a native of Africa, and parti, 

 cularly the Guinea Coast and Angola ; they are said 

 to live in vast troops, and to be dangerous in their 

 attacks upon persons travelling alone in the forests 

 where they are found. They are covered with shi- 

 ning black hair, longest on the back and shoulders ; 

 our description of the adult state is, however, im- 

 perfect, and we refer to the minute detail given by 

 Dr Trail of a young specimen. Previous to men- 

 tioning it, we may relate an account from Bingley's 

 Animal Biography of a large specimen of this creature, 

 which seems to have been given upon some better 

 authority than most of the others : " Allemand, the 

 Dutch professor of natural history, had received many 

 vague and unsatisfactory accounts respecting an ani- 

 mal of this kind, and was induced to write to Mr 

 May, a captain in the Dutch naval service stationed 

 at Surinam. This gentleman found him exactly 

 similar to one which he had brought from Guinea, 

 except in size. He was nearly five feet and a half 

 high, and very strong and powerful. Mr May had 

 seen him take up his master, a stout man, by the 

 middle, and fling him from him for a pace or two ; 

 and one day he seized a soldier, who happened to pass 

 carelessly near the tree to which he was chained, and, 

 if his master had not been present, he would actually 

 have carried the man into the tree." 



