276 APES AND MONKEYS 



and more active than any other of the group. His habitat 

 is in the southeast of Asia ; its outline is vaguely defined, 

 but it includes the Malay Peninsula and many of the 

 contiguous islands east and south of it. 



In model and texture the skeleton of the gibbon j s the 

 most delicate and graceful of all the apes, and in this 

 respect is superior to that of man. He is the only one of 

 the four apes that can walk in an erect position. In doing 

 this the gibbon is awkward and often uses his arms to 

 balance himself. Sometimes he touches his hands to the 

 ground. At other times he raises them above his head or 

 extends them on either side. The length of them is such 

 that he can touch the fingers to the ground while the body 

 is nearly or quite erect. In the spinal column he has two, 

 and sometimes three, sections more than man. His digits 

 are very much longer, but his le^s are nearly the same 

 length, in proportion to his body, as those of man. He 

 has fourteen pairs of ribs. 



The gibbon is the most active and probably the most 

 intelligent of all apes. He is more arboreal in habit than 

 any other. Alan}- stories are told of his agility in climb- 

 ing, and leaping from limb to limb. One authentic report 

 credits one of these apes with leaping a distance of forty- 

 two feet, from the limb of one tree to that of another. 

 Perhaps a better term is to call it swinging, rather than 

 leaping, as these flights are performed chiefly by the arms. 

 Another account is that a gibbon swinging by one hand 

 propelled himself a horizontal distance of eighteen feet 

 through the air, seized a bird in flight, and alighted 

 safely upon another limb, with his prey in hand. 



