52 CURIOUS CREATURES. 



strong, as the Gorilla. Compared with man, its arms 

 seem to be as extravagantly long, as its legs are 

 ridiculously short. When wild, it feeds entirely on 

 vegetable diet, and makes a kind of house, or nest, in 

 trees, interweaving the branches, so as to obtain shelter. 

 They do not stand confinement well, being languid and 

 miserable but, in their native wildness, they can, if 

 necessity arises, fight well in their own defence. A. R. 

 Wallace, in his " Malay Archipelago ; the Land of the 

 Orang Utan and the Bird of Paradise," tells the following 

 story of its combativeness. 



" A few miles down the river there is a Dyak house, 

 and the inhabitants saw a large orang feeding on the 

 young shoots of a palm by the river side. On being 

 alarmed, he retreated towards the jungle, which was close 

 by, and a number of the men, armed with spears and 

 choppers, ran out to intercept him. The man who was 

 in front, tried to run his spear through the animal's body, 

 but the orang seized it in his hands, and in an instant 

 got hold of the man's arm, which he seized in his mouth, 

 making his teeth meet in the flesh above the elbow, 

 which he tore and lacerated in a dreadful manner. Had 

 not the others been close behind, the man would have 

 been seriously injured, if not killed, as he was quite 

 powerless ; but they soon destroyed the creature with 

 their spears and choppers. The man remained ill for 

 a long time, and never fully recovered the use of his 

 arm." 



It is called the Simia Satyrus ; probably on its pre- 

 sumed lustfulness, certainly not on account of its resem- 

 blance to the satyr of antiquity. 



Gesner gives us his idea of the orang, presenting us 

 with the accompanying figure of the Cercopithccus, and 



