232 ANTHROPOID AVES. 



gait, as Huxley justly observes, is tottering; the 

 movement of the body, which is never in an upright 

 position as in man, but bent forward, rolls to some 

 extent from one side to another. As their arms are 

 longer than those of the chimpanzee, they do not 

 reach out so much ; but the gorilla also throws his 

 arms forward, sets his hands upon the ground, then 

 gives a half-swinging, half-springing motion to his 

 body. When assuming the position for walking, 

 the body is much sloped, and its great bulk is so 

 balanced as to bend the arms upwards. In spite 

 of his apparently clumsy and unwieldy form, the 

 gorilla;, like the bear, displays great bodily dexterity. 

 He is a very skilful climber, and, as Koppenfels 

 asserts, when ranging from tree to tree, he will 

 go to their very tops. He first tries whether the 

 branches will bear his weight, and if one branch 

 is not strong enough, he makes use of three or four 

 at once. He will also run along the branches on all 

 fours, stepping warily. Koppenfels saw a full- 

 grown animal, as danger approached, spring down 

 from a tree which was thirty or forty feet high, 

 and then hastily crash through the brushwood. All 

 Huxley's informants concur in the assertion that 

 there is only one adult male attached to each group. 

 As soon as the young male reaches maturity, a conflict 

 for the mastery takes place, and, after his rival is 

 killed or driven away, the stronger, animal becomes 

 the head of the community. 



I have already spoken of the diet of the gorilla. 

 Koppenfels once observed a male and female with 

 two young ones when they were feeding. The head 



