102 PHYSICAL INVESTIGATION. [PART I. 



may be to dwell upon this point, it can easily be shown that 

 there is not much in it after all, for the same peculiarity has 

 been observed not merely in the Australians, 1 who often, to 

 conceal their spears, drag them along between the toes, 2 but 

 also in the Indian on the Orinoco 3 and in Yucatan, where the 

 natives pick up money with their feet, and throw stones with 

 them. 4 The jugglers at the court of Montezuma performed 

 their extraordinary tricks with the feet: some of these performers 

 Cortez took to Spain, where such feats are only performed with 

 the hands. 5 The Marquesas islanders, the Malays of Luzon and 

 Samar, and some inhabitants of Sumatra, also use their feet, 

 and specially the first and second toes, to raise light objects. 6 

 Such facts may have induced Bory 7 to maintain that the oppo- 

 sable thumbs on the lower extremities of the ape cannot be con- 

 sidered as a specific difference between it and man, mentioning 

 at the same time that this peculiarity is possessed in the same, 

 or even in a higher, degree by the gum-gatherers of Marrensin, 

 (Dep. desLandes), in consequence of much climbing. At any 

 rate, the resemblance in this respect of the Negro to the ape 

 must be abandoned. How much the use of the limbs is due to 

 training is shown by the Bayaderes in the East Indies. Already 

 in the course of the first year the mother of the future Baya- 

 dere at Java bends the limbs of her child cautiously in every 

 direction. The Bayadere is able to bend the last phalanx of 

 the fingers separately, forwards and backwards, to make 

 the back of the hand* as concave as the palm, and even to 

 place the whole hand back upon the forearm. Her toes possess 

 the same flexibility and capacity for grasping as the fingers, 

 and the vertebral column is flexible in every direction. 8 



1 Mitchell, " Three Expeditions, i, p. 303, 1838 ; Howitt, " Impressions of 

 Austr. Felix," p. 284, 1845 ; Hodgson, Eeminisc. of Austr," p. 245, 1846. 



2 King, " Narr. of a survey of the coasts of Austr./' i, p. 370, 1827. 

 s Gillii, " Nachr. vom Lande Guiana," p. 252, 1785. 



4 Waldeck, " Voy. dans la prov. d' Yucatan," p. 65, 1838. 



5 " Gomara in " Historiad. prem. de Ind.," p. 342, Madrid, 1852. 



6 Langsdorff, " Bemerk. auf einer Eeise um die Welt," i, p. 151, 1812 ; 

 Mallat, " Les Philippines," ii, p. 38, 1846 ; de Pages, " Eeise um die Welt," 

 p. 175, 1786; Marsden, "Sumatra," 1788; Eengger, "Naturgesch. derSaugeth 

 von Paraguay," ii, p. 376. 



7 " L'Homme," i, p. 45, 1827. 



8 Gumprecht, "Ztschft. f. allg. Erdk.," ii, p. 118, 1854, nach dem Tageb. 

 eines officiers. 



